Game Changer
by NotthatSmart234
Summary: The war against Voldemort spilled over into the muggle world; SHIELD got involved. Two of their best became the most feared people in the magical world. When their daughter enters Hogwarts alongside Harry Potter; how will her heritage change the wizarding world? The game changes, and some people don't like it a all.
1. Prolouge

**Disclaimer- I don't own Harry Potter or the Avengers.**

**This is an idea I'm playing around with while I have time off school. I'm not the best writer out there but I really hope some of you enjoy this story as much as I had fun writing this. **

**_Read review and enjoy._**

**_Prologue- An office somewhere in the Scottish Highlands._**

_"I want the mudblood gone!" A bearded man ordered, pacing in his ornate office filled with whizzing and ticking trinkets. The mid July sun pulsed into the office, making it increasingly stuffy. Although it was mid-summer, said bearded man was plotting ways to get rid of one of his supposed "prized" students._

_"What do you mean headmaster?" Replied the other man, he wore black robes and they looked as if they hadn't been washed in over a year._

_"She's getting too close to him. He's becoming harder to manipulate the more he contacts his friends outside of school. The wards on Privet Drive are failing."_

_"Block the owls then?" He suggested._

_"I can't do that now. He's already been invited to the World Cup."_

_"I assume the mudblood will also be in attendance?"_

_"That is correct. Although we could work that to our advantage."_

_"What do you mean?"_

_"Well rumour has it amongst the guards of Azkaban that it wasn't Barty Crouch Jr that died that day; it was his mother. And there have been sightings of the man in Little Hangleton, where Riddle Manor lies. Now correct me if I'm wrong but this might be year Voldemort rises again and Barty Crouch is the man behind everything."_

_"And Barty Crouch Sr will be at the World Cup final along with many other Death Eaters where an attack will happen. If Lucius Malfoy is there he will join in and attempt to attack the blood traitors and the mudblood. It could succeed."_

_"Or go terribly wrong," Interrupted the sorting hat. "What's to say they go after the owners of the campground and just set fire to a few tents? If the final is going to be as big as you say it is; how will they find just a mere handful when there are thousands of people out like sitting ducks."_

_The bearded man glared at the beaten up hat menacingly. He wanted things to turn out perfectly. He wanted to win this war. He wanted to rule the world his way. _

_He wanted the mudblood prodigy gone, out of their hair. He wanted to be able to mold their savior perfectly. He didn't want his efforts spoiled by a girl who knew too much. Everything had to be perfect this time around; SHIELD was not getting involved again. Especially those two murderers._

_"If the world cup goes wrong. Should I arrange a potions accident? The fourth years are going to start using the rather explosive ingredients this year. It wouldn't take much for me to slip the wrong ingredient and set of a catastrophic explosion that would cause damage serious enough to almost force her muggle parents to pull her out of the school. Whilst in the hospital, you could cast a memory charm that would remove her memories of magic." Suggested the black robed man._

_"It would work. But I don't think a potions accident would cut it- it risks the Slytherin students that we need so desperately. I already know a man that could do the job without remorse. All I have to do is contact and old friend."_

_"Very well then. I assume it shall be a surprise attack?"_

_"Exactly."_

_The dark haired man left the office with a swish of his robes. Bearded man's blue eyes twinkled deviously as he stared out of the large bay window of his office._

_"Hail Hydra." He muttered._

**Please review? I'd love to hear what you think!**


	2. Chapter 1

**_King's Cross Station. 20_****_th_****_ June 2012_**_._

A large steam train pulled to a stop and let out an overflowing stream of students for the summer break. Many were lost in the crowd; some fighting their fellow classmates for a view of their waiting parents. Though it is the smooth strolling of one student we lay our eyes on today.

Her parents wouldn't be here to pick her up this time. Too busy at work, she told her friends back in the compartment. She wasn't bothered, it was only her dad last year and her mother the year before that. Their jobs often forced the family to be apart for long periods of time quite frequently. _Hopefully next year would be different. _She thought, approaching the wall that separates the bizarre and backwards magical world from the sane and advanced mundane world. Without turning around to say goodbye to a family of poor but kind redheads she stepped through the wall and into the depths of mundane London.

Commuters bustled around the platform, safely hiding the girl from view of the hidden portal. Walking further away she merged with the crowd until she could exit the busy train station. She changed exit routes so no one could see what she would do next, her out of control brown hair calmed down into ringlet curls and shortened until it reached her shoulders and changed into a vibrant shade of red only possible by dye. Dull mud coloured eyes ebbed away to reveal a startling shade of blue. She grew smaller and more slender. Pale skin, scars and muscles replaces her tanned and unblemished disguise. For the finishing touch she pulled out the prosthetic bucked teeth and threw them in the nearest bin. The tasteless and frumpy clothes she wore were replaced by dark skinny jeans, a navy blue vest, heeled boots and a black leather jacket with a geometrical eagle sewn on the right sleeve.

The phone kept hidden in her pocket rang. Pulling it out quickly, "Barton speaking." She answered.

"We need you to come in." A voice on the other end told her.

"Where?"

"New Mexico. We've been monitoring the Tesseract while you've been undercover. You might want to have a look at it."

"What's it doing?" She asked, narrowly avoiding colliding into a large whale of a man with several chins and a cherry red face that came with overworking the body's limits. "Watch it, arsehole!" She spat at him. The man wasn't listening as no reaction came.

"We don't know. The energy levels are going crazy at the moment."

"So you want me to work out what's going on?"

"That's exactly what we want."

She paused, "I'm in. When do you need me?"

"Tomorrow. There's a jet waiting for you at Heathrow right now. You can hand in your mission report while we're there. And there's one more thing."

"Yes Coulson?"

"You'll be working with you dad on this one Hermione."

The phone call ended after those parting words, performing her mental badly choreographed victory dance Hermione wormed her way towards the taxi rank and climbed in the nearest unoccupied vehicle

"Where to miss?" The cabbie asked.

"Heathrow. As fast as you can."

Without saying a word the cabbie drove off and pushed his car through the heavily populated capital.

**_New Mexico- One month later._**

The evacuation order had sent the base into frenzy. Operatives and scientists alike ran around in a flurry getting all they could out of the base before it would inevitably collapse in on itself. Yet despite being the youngest still working in the base, Hermione was perched high in the room watching everything going on with her father sat next to her. Their legs dangled from the railings as they watched the scientists attempt to work out why the Tesseract was misbehaving. Clint Barton looked at her daughter who was reading a huge tome on Norse mythology.

"So what do you think it's doing?" He asked her.

"I don't think it's anything to do with its energy output. According to this book, when the Asgardians defeated the Jotuns on Earth they left behind a gift that opened a portal between worlds. And where did Schmidt find the Tesseract?" Hermione explained.

"Norway. So you're saying the tampering isn't on our side?"

"I'm saying someone wants to get onto Earth. And it won't be a friendly."

"What makes you say that?"

"According to mythology, the Bifrost was the only sanctioned way to travel between the worlds. We know when the Bifrost is used due to strange runic markings on the ground. Whoever's out there can't access the Bifrost hence why he's trying to use the Tesseract to get here. Therefore by that deduction not a friendly."

"You're good." He told her.

"I'm only doing my job. Unlike some people I can name." She turned to look at her dad who should really be watching the scientists from the ground like the other agents.

"I see better from a distance."

"Sure you do." She said sarcastically, although knowing he was the best sniper SHIELD had. They watched as Nick Fury stormed in with his trench coat trailing behind him. The eye patch wearing Director spoke with Doctor Selvig about something. She watched as her father listened to his comm link and stood up.

"I have to go down. If anything goes wrong I want you to get in a car and go as far away as you can."

Her father slid down the rope and walked towards Fury. Hermione listened to their conversation.

"I gave you this detail to keep an eye on things." She heard Fury say to her dad.

"Well I see better from a distance." Her dad replied sharply.

"Are you seeing anything that might set this thing off?" Fury asked.

"No one's come or gone. No contacts, IMs. If there was any tampering sir, it wasn't at this end."

"At this end?"

"Yeah, Hermione said The Cube is a doorway to the other end of space. Doors open on both sides." Clint repeated.

As if it was waiting for those words, the Tesseract activated, sending out a pulsing blue light that threw everyone off balance. Once the blue light cleared, Hermione saw a figure crouched about ten feet away from the device. She could now work out black, green and gold, with a mean looking sceptre with a glowing blue light attached.

"Sir! Please put down the spear!" Fury ordered. The figure rose out of his position and started firing at the equipment and various agents around the room. Despite the urgency to leave the room Hermione couldn't bring herself to her feet and leave to the car. Hermione watched in horror as the strange man muttered something and jammed the sceptre into her father's chest and forced his mind under his control. Director Fury used the stranger's carnage to pull the cube from its holding spot and lock it back into the metal briefcase for transportation. "Barton, leave. That's an order." Fury demanded.

Wasting no time at all Hermione slipped out of her position and vaulted over the guardrail, slipping into the shadows and sprinting all the way to the front entrance. The car she was meant to take was gone, a trail of raised dust floated to the ground 400 meters away. Taking a deep breath Hermione spotted the abandoned car on the other side of the road and ran across, pulling open the door and throwing herself inside. Quickly finding the keys already in the ignition she started the engine and sped out of the facility as fast as the car would go; which was pretty fast. Hermione mentally thanked her father for teaching her to drive two years ago after her friend's incident with the Ford Anglia.

She felt the car jolt and shudder as the ground trembled. It didn't take much to realize that the Base had collapsed, bringing down tonnes of rock on whoever was left there. She pressed on the gas pedal harder, hoping she would get out of the way. Luck wasn't on her side; Hermione felt the car tip sideways and glass shatter and scratch her face. Her left side exploded in pain as car landed driver's side down on the desert sand.

"Barton!" She heard on the radio attached to her right hip, "Barton what is your status?" she pulled out the radio and answered.

"I'm okay, just cuts and bruises" She told him, unbuckling the seatbelt and climbing out the right side. Hermione stood on the wrecked car and looked at the lost base.

"Sound the general call; I want every living soul not needing rescue looking for that briefcase." Fury ordered.

"Rodger that." Hill replied.

"Coulson, Barton get back to base. This is a level seven. As of right now, we are at war."

_Well there go my plans for a peaceful summer. Again._ Hermione thought bitterly, jumping off the car and following the road.

Nothing would ever be the same for Hermione Barton. Not even if she tried.

**Thank you so much for 300 views, 11 favorites and 15 followers! I never thought I'd get that with something like this!**

**Quotes from the movie I found on IMDb and .**

**Thank you! Please review!**


	3. Chapter 2

**Disclaimer: I don't own.**

**_Hellicarrier-3_****_rd_****_ August 2012._**

Hermione sat between two window frames of the Bridge, contemplating her life. 10 months of the year trapped in a backwards magical society under the name Hermione Jean Granger and the other 2 fighting crime on a global scale with S.H.I.E.L.D as Hermione Romanoff-Barton; child of the Black Widow and Hawkeye; codename still not decided and often the subject of many conversations.

Her age alone made things difficult; many of the operatives junior and senior alike didn't think she was ready for the stress that came with working for an international peacekeeping force. Despite the fact she was the youngest on the current Avengers Initiative and has personally escorted several international criminals to the gates of hell; not enough people took her seriously. The fact that her father was taken right in front of her didn't help matters at all with some of the more senior agents *cough Sitwell cough*.

She watched the clouds roll by as agents scoured the planet looking for any signs of Loki or her father by hacking into anything that had a camera on it somewhere. Agent Coulson stood bopping away to her mother's hold music (breaking bones; by the way) as he called her in. Realising that moping about her rather unfortunate life wouldn't find her father or kick Loki's ass into next week Hermione walked back to her room only to be stopped by Director Fury.

"Barton." He snapped, Hermione turned around to face her boss.

"That's me."

"We need you to bring Captain Rodgers in."

"But wouldn't Captain Rodgers object to a 14 year old girl working for a super-secret agency?" Hermione asked.

"You can either bring in Stark or you can bring in Rodgers; take your pick."

"Let me get changed." Hermione grabbed the file in Fury's hands and walked to her room.

An hour later, Hermione walked into the gym where Captain Rodgers was pummelling the stuffing out of a punching bag. He punched harder and harder until the bag was thrown off its chain, spilling its contents all over the floor. Rodgers picked up another punching bag and hooked it onto the chain before continuing punching.

"Trouble sleeping?" Hermione called out, stepping away from the shadows of the entrance. Steve looked towards her.

"I've slept for 70 years miss. I think I've had enough rest. How are old are you anyway?" He replied, punching the bag a few more times.

I'm fourteen."

"And you're already caught up with saving the world for S.H.I.E.L.D? I thought they were better than that." Captain Rodgers gestured towards the healing scabs across her face.

"S.H.I.E.L.D is waiting until I'm 18 before I go make the big decision on saving the world. Mostly I'm around. There isn't much they can do when both my parents are working."

Steve paused, before walking to his gym bag and unravelling the bandages across his knuckles, "When I went under, the world was at war. I wake up, they say we won. They didn't say we lost." He said.

"We've made a few mistakes along the way. Some very recently."

"Are you here for something?"

"Fury sent me here."

"Is he giving me a mission?"

"Yes."

"Trying to get me back into the world?"

"Actually he wants you to help save it." Hermione handed Steve the file.

"HYDRA's secret weapon." He told her.

"When looking for you Howard Stark fished that out of the ocean. He thought what we think: the Tesseract could be the key to unlimited sustainable energy. That's something the world sorely needs."

"Who took it from you?"

"He's called Loki. He's not exactly from around here. There's a lot we'll have to bring you up to speed on. The world has gotten stranger than you already know."

"At this point I doubt anything would surprise me."

"Ten dollars says your wrong. There's a debriefing packet waiting for you at your apartment. Is there anything we ought to know about the Tesseract?"

Steve picked up a punching bag and walked past Hermione to the exit. "You should have left it in the ocean."

"Of course we should have." Hermione muttered to herself; following Steve out of the gym.

**_Hellicarrier- 5_****_th_****_ August 2012_**

_Dear Hermione,_

_How are you? Ron told me that you weren't able to attend the World Cup Final with us this summer because you're on holiday. It's a shame but I know you're not that bothered by quidditch so I don't think you'll find the final any fun. Will you be able to meet with us one day for Diagon Alley before we go back? I still need to get my supplies and I doubt the Weasley's have even thought about it yet. How did you find the homework? And yes Hermione I've done it all. What else was I meant to do at Durzkaban? I don't think Ron's done any of it but there's no surprise there._

_By the way I've been watching that show you told me about; Game of Thrones was it? It's amazing! Is Joffrey based of Malfoy or something? And does Walder Frey look like Flilch to you? _

_Have a nice summer!_

_Harry._

Hermione read the letter from Harry as Hedwig flew around the Bridge, terrorizing the agents sat at the computers looking for Loki via the world's cameras. Hedwig always dive-bombed the rather monotonous worker bees much to the amusement of anyone who knew who Hedwig belonged to. Right now the owl was set on terrorising the shiny, bald head of Agent Sitwell who took to sprinting around the room; trying to shake the bird of prey off. A giant ball of squished ginger followed right at Sitwell's feet, nipping at his the ankles of his expensive suit.

Three sets of footsteps stopped at the left on Hermione; indicating that the new guests had arrived. She turned her head quickly and saw her mother with Doctor Banner and Steve Rodgers. Natasha drunk in the sight of a dishevelled looking Sitwell and the two rather smug looking animals and turned to her daughter, "How many times have I told you; no animals on the Bridge!" She reprimanded.

"Then there's no fun!" Hermione cried out. Soon after that Hedwig stopped chasing Sitwell and flew over to the two new people. She settled herself on Bruce's shoulder and started gently nipping his ear.

"She likes you." Natasha told him. Steve then handed the 10 dollars to Hermione.

"You're magical?" He asked her. Hermione's brain went dead before remembering that Hogwarts was used as an SSR base during World War 2.

"Yeah. I take it you met Dumbledore before you went under?"

"He's strange to put it bluntly."

"If you thought he was strange then, you should see him now. He's headmaster at Hogwarts."

"So who owns the owl? I thought they were developing some form of mailbox that automatically sent the letter to its recipient."

"I've never heard of any mailboxes. They've always used owls."

"Magic? Owls? What have I missed?" Doctor Banner interrupted the two.

"Technically it's the manipulation of an un-named energy but the manipulators hide from normal society due to the Witch Trials hundreds of years ago. We don't hear about them; they don't hear about us. The magicals believe it to be the safest policy. Do we have the old pamphlet kicking around anywhere?" Natasha explained.

"A photocopy should be in the back of the case file." Hermione replied as Fury walked onto and shook Banner's hand.

"Doctor, thank you for coming." He says

"Thanks for asking nicely. So how long am I staying?" Banner asked.

"Once we get our hands on the Tesseract, you're in the clear."

"Where are you with that?"

Fury turns to Coulson to explain as Natasha starts fiddling with a computer scanning for Hermione's dad. "We're sweeping every wirelessly accessible camera on the planet," Coulson explained, "phones, laptops. If it's connected to a satellite, it's eyes and ears for us."

"That's still not going to find them in time." Natasha mumbled bitterly.

"You have to narrow the field," Banner told them, taking off his jacket, "How many spectrometers do you have access to?"

"How many are there?" Fury asked.

"Call every lab you know, tell them to put the spectrometers on the roof and calibrate them for gamma rays. I'll rough out a tracking algorithm based on cluster recognition. At least we can rule out a few places. Do you have somewhere for me to work?"

"Agent Romanoff, would you show to his laboratory please."

Natasha nods and walks back to the exit as Banner picks up his stuff and follows her, "You're gonna love it Doc. We got all the toys."

Hermione sat at the conference table, twirling a pen in her hand as a rough draft of her Defense Against the Dark Arts essay lay abandoned almost finished in front of her. _So that's Captain America_, She thought, _He's taller than I'd thought he'd be. No wonder Peggy liked him. _

Captain Rodgers stood talking to a completely star struck Coulson about his vintage trading cards.

"I mean, if it's not too much trouble." She overheard.

"No, no. It's fine." Captain Rodgers reassures him.

"It's a vintage set. It took me a couple of years to collect them all," _He's making them sound like Pokémon sets._

Coulson was interrupted by a freshly changed Sitwell who called out to everyone in the room, "We got a hit. Sixty seven percent match. Weight, cross match, seventy nine percent."

"Location?" Coulson asked.

"Stuttgart, Germany. 28 Konigsrtasse. He's not exactly hiding." Sitwell pointed out. He was right; all Loki's Asgardian garb was replaced by a posh black and green suit. The scepter he used on her dad transfigured into an ornate walking stick with the blue power source as the handle.

"Captain, you're up." Fury ordered.

**Phew!**

**Thank you for waiting patiently while I was writing this. I couldn't think of how to go with it and then school started and I got a load of homework. **

**Please review/favorite/follow?**

**Until next time,**

**Lauren. **


	4. Chapter 3

**Disclaimer- I don't own.**

Hermione was asleep when Loki was marched in early the next morning. After throwing the paperweight she kept on her bedside table at the poor intern Sitwell sent Hermione threw on a loose jacket on top of her leggings and t shirt and padded down to the bridge and joined the rest of the Avengers in discussing Loki. Ignoring the dissaproving stares of the professional agents Hermione wasted no time in pouring herself a large mug of coffee and plonking herself down on the seat next to her mother. No one said anything, instead focusing their attention to the live feed of Loki's interrogation.

"In case it is unclear, you try to escape, you so much as scratch that glass," Fury began, pushing a button that sent wind flying into the room from underneath the cell, "thirty thousand feet straight down in a steel trap. You get how that works? Ant," He gestures to Loki, "boot." He turns back to the panel and closes the door.

Loki laughs, "It's an impressive cage. Not built I think, for me." He says.

"Built for something a lot stronger than you."

"Oh I've heard," the Asgardian turns to face the camera, "the mindless beast, makes play to be the man. How desperate are you? You call on these lost creatures to defend you." Loki taunts.

"How desperate am I? You threaten my world with war. You steal a force you can't hope to control. You talk about peace yet you kill 'cause it's fun. You have made me very desperate. You might not be glad that you did."

"It burns you to come so close. To have the Tesseract, to have power, unlimited power. And for what? A warm light for all mankind to share, and then to be reminded what real power is."

Fury rolls his eye, "Yeah, well, you let me know if Real Power wants a magazine or something."

The video feed cuts out before the team could find out whether Loki wanted a magazine or not. "He really grows on you, doesn't he?" Banner broke the silence around the table as Hermione took a sip of her coffee.

"Loki's gonna drag this out. So Thor, what's his play?" Asked Steve, who still wore his suit but without the cowl. Apparently they still wanted to keep the bright colours of his old costume even though for the things SHIELD had planned for Captain America; bright colours weren't exactly going to assist him take part in a black ops mission. They're called black for a reason.

"He has an army called the Chitauri, that's none of Asgard nor any world known. He plans to lead them against your people. They will win him the Earth. In return, I suspect for the Tesseract." The Norse god told them. Someone really had to update him on 21st century English. Though his arms were something else. Obviously Darcy Lewis wasn't lying about anything on the report.

"An army. From outer space."

"So he's building another portal. That's what he needs Erik Selvig for." Bruce realised.

"Selvig?"

"He's an astrophysicist."

"He's a friend." _Ohh yeah. Selvig was there when Thor arrived on Earth for the first time. I wonder if anyone has told Jane anything yet._

"Loki has him under some kind of spell, along with one of ours." Natasha explained.

"I wanna know why Loki let us take him. He's not leading an army from here." Steve reasoned easily.

"I don't think we should be focusing on Loki. That guy's brain is a bag full of cats, you could smell crazy on him." Bruce kindly pointed out, doing his best to switch the conversation and get back to doing his job.

"I don't care how you speak. Loki is beyond reason, but he is of Asgard, and he's my brother." Thor defended.

"He killed eighty people in two days." Natasha pointed out bluntly.

"He's adopted."

"I don't think the adoption excuse is good enough here Thor," Hermione started, "It may be different in Asgard but most people that have only just discovered their heritage maybe run away for a few days or become detached to their surroundings; not try and take over a planet his people haven't done anything wrong to. The Loki that arrived on Earth wasn't the Loki you grew up with."

Thor looked ready to argue, but his face fell short. He obviously thought that Hermione was at least partially correct. Getting Thor to agree with Hermione was a start in preventing too many casualties caused by the man trying to show him some mercy.

"Iridium, what did they need the iridium for?" Bruce asked himself, trying to work out the list of things bought or stolen by the missing agents or known enemies of S.H.I.E.L.D.

"It's a stabilising agent," Tony says as he walks in with Coulson, who then pauses to tell him something about Portland, "Means the portal won't collapse in on itself like it did at S.H.I.E.L.D. No hard feelings Point Break, you've got a mean swing," Tony stopped by Thor and tapped his arm a few times to prove his statement, "Also, it means the portal can open as wide and stay open as long as Loki wants." He explained, before walking up to Fury's command centre and looking around, "Raise the mizzenmast. Jib the topsails," He ordered the command agents who stared back at the billionaire blankly.

Hermione rolled her eyes at the man and took a sip of her coffee. Genius Tony Stark may be; his rather rude sense of humour was going to get him punched be someone at some point during his stay here.

"That man is playing Galaga!" He shouted, pointing at the intern at the back, "Thought we wouldn't notice, but we did."

Steve looked confused, "It's an interactive game that requires you to shoot down a fleet of alien spaceships before they get to where you are positioned." Hermione quickly explained. He nodded and tuned back out.

"How does Fury even see these?" Tony asked.

"He turns." Agent Hill replied.

"Sounds exhausting. The rest of the raw materials, Agent Barton can get his hands on pretty easily. Only major component he still needs is a power source. A high energy density, something to kick start the cube." _Did he just put something under the command system?_

"When did you become an expert in thermonuclear astrophysics?"

"Last night. The packet, Selvig's notes, the extraction theory papers. Am I the only one who did the reading? And is that coffee in your hand Blair Witch?"

"I got a page in before the words got too big to be comprehensible at eleven pm." Hermione chipped in.

"Says the girl who speaks fluent Latin, Russian, French and Spanish and passable in about seven others, is possibly capable of summoning a demon and knows people capable of meddling with the fabric of space" He bit back, trying to swipe Hermione's coffee mug for himself.

"I'm passable in 9 now, and for the last time demons do not exist Tony. I've checked every book in the school's library. And if you want coffee you can get your own."

"Does Loki need any particular kind of power source?" Steve interrupted.

"He's got to heat up the cube to a hundred and twenty million kelvin just to break through the Coulomb barrier." Bruce recalled.

"Unless Selvig has figured out how to stabilize the quantum tunnelling effect." Tony suggested, ditching his attempts for Hermione's coffee and moving around the table to talk to Bruce.

"Well if he could do that he could achieve Heavy Ion Fusion at any reactor on the planet."

"Finally, someone who speaks English."

"Is that what just happened?" Asked Steve, turning so that he could see the two scientists shake hands.

"It's good to meet you Dr Banner. Your work on anti-electron collisions is unparalleled. And I'm a huge fan of the way you lose control and turn into an enormous green rage monster."

Bruce looked taken aback, shocked at the passiveness about the Hulk comment, "Thanks."_ Tact is evidently something that Tony Stark doesn't have. I think he may be worse than Ron at it._

"Dr Banner is only here to track the cube. I was hoping you might join him. Same goes for you Hermione; you know magic better than anyone. Let's see if there's a signal you can trace." Fury told the group. Hermione smoothly got out of her seat and picked up her mug.

"Let's start with that stick of his. It may be magical but it works an awful lot like a Hydra weapon." Steve suggested. _I need to dig one out of storage then and see if the energy used to power them is the same._

"I don't know about that, but it is powered by the cube. And I'd like to know how Loki used it to turn two of the sharpest men I know into his personal flying monkeys."

Thor looked rather confused, "Monkeys? I do not understand."

"I do! I understood that reference." Steve proudly exclaimed like it was an achievement. Which is was, in terms of having to put up with Stark's antics for who knows how long.

Hermione on the other hand refilled her cup and passed another full one to her mother who really looked as though she needed it. After that she turned to Bruce and Stark who were waiting on the hallway, "Let me get changed and grab a few things from storage and I'll meet you in the lab. Does that sound okay?"

"Perfect."

**_Headmaster's office- the same time._**

_After two weeks of thinking and planning, the old bearded man snapped his fingers and called in his greasy haired, hooked nosed advisor._

_"I have decided I do not want to eliminate the mudblood, Severus," the old man began, "She may become useful to us as a way to keep an eye on Potter as the years tick by. No, killing her would be far too dangerous on my part."_

_The bat looked around at the various ticking instruments around the room, taking notice of the dimming in the one with the glowing orb in the centre, "So what do you suggest?" He asked in surprise. He'd already began concocting the potion that would line the bullets after all. Basilisk venom was highly potent ingredient to mess with._

_"We still bring in the asset of course. But instead of him killing her the night of the first task as originally planned we send him in during a class changeover the next Wednesday."_

_"That way she'll be dealt with in front of a large group and there won't be anywhere for her to run," Severus concluded, "How will this change things for us, for her?"_

_"What I noticed during the years spent fighting Grindlewald and the Nazis is that bullets won't ever be removed by magic. When the mudblood is placed under anaesthetic we can slip compliance and trust potions into her system. When I ask her to jump, she'll say how high? I feel that compliance would be the only way to solve our little issue with the mudblood."_

_"Why not just use the imperious curse?"_

_"It would be too obvious to those too close to her. The change in her behaviour would be too obvious."_

_Severus thought for a moment, "I see. How strong would these potions have to be?"_

_"Strong enough to last until the end of her time at school or until my death at least. Can't have her following anyone else now can we?"_

_Severus turned to leave the room, "Very well then." His hand twisted the gold plated doorknob and pulled it open slightly, only to be paused by the bearded man._

_"Oh and Severus, should be not survive the ordeal I wanted her painted in a bad light. So make sure that Mr Malfoy and his goons give her a lot of special attention. Perhaps extend the invite some of the boys from Drumstrang when they visit? After all, the wizarding world hates a scarlet woman. I want Potter to be butter in my hands." _

_"Of course, Albus."_

**Dun Dun Dunnnn!**

**Not really if you think about the way Hermione is treated by Skeeter and Molly Weasley during Goblet of Fire. So do expect some little scuffles or spy awesomeness from Hermione during those chapters. I do sort of have an idea of how the attack in Hogwarts is going to go but I have three possibilities and I can't decide. It's either:**

**Hermione gets shot trying to hide and she "dies" from shock (aka Tetradoxine B) and Pomfrey has her body sent out via train and then SHIELD pick her up and she joins the Avengers in New York.**

**Hermione gets shot trying to stop the man from hurting anyone else but still kicks ass in the process because why not?**

**Dumbledore calls in a favour for Captain America to visit when the attack happens so that Hermione can be shot in front of him. That causes SHIELD to cut ties out of safety concerns but they still pull Hermione out because they were there because Captain America needed a lift.**

**At the minute I'm going for the last one as it has an awesome fight dynamic where the two tag team and take down a lot of people without anyone knowing.**

**Anyone of the three ideas work with the way I want the plotline to go but I want to know what you lovely people think first before I get to that part. I'll let you know when that scene is going to be typed up so the voting can stop.**

**Thank you for reading. And please take the time to review. It does mean a lot to me.**

**Lauren.**


	5. Chapter 4

**Disclaimer- I don't own. Though I wish I did.**

Once showered and changed, Hermione grabbed a bite to eat from the abysmally grey cafeteria (Health food. _Ugh, give me pizza, pop tarts and twizzlers any day. Stuff the risk of heart disease) _and then remembered her dad's hidden stash of pop tarts he reserves for the rookies when they get homesick or just tired of the "rabbit food" SHIELD forces down their necks. It happens a lot even when the agents aren't classed as rookies anymore, so the giant box rammed in back of utensil cupboard is always full of random personal favourites of anyone who knows where it is. Overtime, one box became too small, and too limited to the number of agents who could get to it; so other rookies placed similar boxes in the other kitchens and did the same.

After a chair had been scraped towards the utensil cupboard and Hermione balancing on top, the young with began moving around the skillets and cast iron pans to reach the box of sugary breakfast treats and pull it out without making a huge clatter that would get her into trouble with Sitwell (who had been keeping a very keen eye on her recently. And it didn't have anything to do with her dad being compromised or her being the youngest field agent in history.) When she did get the box down she rifled through it quickly and pulled out as many strawberry flavoured as quickly as possible before unwrapping them and throwing them in the toaster.

Hermione drummed her hands on the counter as her breakfast cooked, before pulling out a plate and waiting for the strawberry goodness to pop out of the toaster and supply her with the nutrients to make it through the day. When they did come out Hermione wasted no time in pulling them onto her plate, leaving just one for her to take on the road to the lab.

"Is where I may find the tarts of pop?" A loud voice boomed from the doorway. Hermione turned around in shock only to see Thor investigating the contents of the room.

"Yeah, sure. The Pop Tarts are in here," Hermione replied, hiding her fright and sliding the box over to the demigod, "Just pick whichever you want, unwrap them and stick them in the toaster and pull the lever down." Hermione explained. Thor looked through the contents and then turned towards her.

"I'm afraid I don't know what many of these fillings are." He told her, shame in his voice at his lack of knowledge of his own personal tastes.

"Well that's okay. See the only way to know if you like something is to experiment. Pick whichever one you like. There's not a bad flavour in the box." Hermione told him. Thor pulled out two chocolate ones,

"Will these suffice?"

"Those will do brilliantly," Hermione took them from him and put them in the toaster before taking a bite out of those on her plate, "So what happened for Loki to come here? He doesn't look like the sort of person who would come here to see the sights." She asked.

"He fell of the Bifrost in battle shortly after I left for Asgard. We thought he was dead, no one had ever survived being off realm the way he had."

"So he just floated until he met his sponsor, and this was after he discovered his adoption?"

"Yes. Loki was never meant to rule Asgard; he thought that by killing me and the Jotuns would result in our people gladly accepting him as ruler. However when his plan backfired he thought that death would be the better option over possibly life in the dungeons."

"Is he really capable of taking over us?"

"I am not so sure anymore. Loki has changed, but he is still my brother and I hope he shall listen to what I have to say."

"And his weapon, have you seen that before?"

"Nay, it must belong to whoever found him and sent him on this dark spiral. I am not sure what it is capable of either, it will have to go back with me to Asgard as well as the Tesseract."

"So long as you are more capable of protecting it then I don't think we will have a problem with that."

In that moment the chocolate pop tarts exploded out of the toaster, Thor flinched but remained passive as Hermione pulled them out and put them on a plate, "Hope you enjoy," She told him, sliding the plate towards him. Thor took an impossibly large bite out of one and nodded in approval.

"You are magical are you not?" He asked out of nowhere.

"How did you know?"

"I can sense your power. It is in ways similar to Loki's and yet different. I'd assumed the magicals had died out centuries ago, obviously my father was wrong."

"Not so much dead, but just hiding. The mortals started burning large numbers of our population so they just went dark and stopped showing themselves. I guess it worked if you couldn't find them. They built their own little world to hide and rule for themselves, barely anyone interfered with that until around the time I was born."

"And why is that?" He asked, Hermione looked down at her watch. Stark and Banner would be waiting.

"It's a really long story and I haven't got time to tell you it right now. I have to go help Stark find out where Loki is hiding the Tesseract and he isn't very patient. I'll tell you the story when I get the chance." Hermione apologised, grabbing her plate, Thor nodded and let Hermione pass.

"I shall hold you to that, Lady Emerys."

Hermione faltered at the formal name, "I'm sorry? Did you just call me Emerys?"

"Did I offend you in anyway? I apologise if so but that is who you remind me of. In magical power of course."

_Did he just compare me to Merlin of all people? If I'm powerful enough to be compared to Merlin, how must Harry and Dumbledore fare?"_

"No, no. It's not that I take the name in the wrong way, it's because my friend has always been the more powerful one of the two of us and if you compare me to Merlin then how powerful must Harry be?" She explained.

"I do not know, but that will be a case of meeting him to find out. Good day Lady Emerys."

Thor let Hermione pass into the hallway and she walked to the lab in a daze. Her, comparable in power to Merlin himself? Impossible. It should be Harry, after all he was the one to be the youngest to cast the patronous charm. But coming from a god (alien, whatever he was) who was alive at the same time as Merlin it was almost believable. There wasn't a way to record power that long ago, so Thor's words must be true.

Speaking of Harry, Hermione wandered how he was. Her best friend should be staying at the Weasleys now, safe from his horrible excuses for relatives. Oh how Fury and Coulson had tried getting him out of there both legally and forcefully; they were squashed at the first hurdle every time by a mysterious wizard in Dumbledore's pocket. So they settled for a simple and discreet security system and Hermione every so often pulling a stupid immoral stunt to see how he reacts, the last one being to report his firebolt to McGonagall since it came from his at the time fugitive godfather. Hermione felt so guilty walking into the common room with her head of house behind her; despite Fury's reassurance that what she did was right, what she was hiding was right. No one knew her real identity, although she had a feeling that would change soon, a storm was coming and Hermione could already sense it wasn't going to be favourable in her direction.

She was snapped out of her thoughts when the door to the lab flung open and Captain Rogers stormed out and almost crashed into her plate, "I'm sorry Miss." He apologised, still polite even when angry.

"No, I should have been looking where I was going," Hermione replied, taking notice of his height, she knew she was short but the fact Captain Rogers stood literal head and shoulders above her was just humiliating, "Is everything alright?"

"I'm fine Miss, do you know where the storage room is?" He asked.

"It's on the bottom deck, last door on the corridor if you take the nearest staircase." _Weird question, there's nothing down there but some old HYDRA weapons. What's he up to? _"Just don't be an idiot okay, contrary to Stark's belief we do actually need you and you do not want to get on Fury's worse side right now."

"Speak from personal experience about Fury's bad side?"

"I grew up in this organisation, of course I've annoyed the higher ups enough times to know when they're on the verge of throwing someone off a building, or in this case the hellicarrier."

"I'll bear that in mind, thank you Miss."

"And call me Hermione, I won't beat you up for calling me my given name."

Captain Rogers started walking to the staircase, "Will do Hermione."

**End.**

**Honestly this was such a hard chapter to write, I have a thing with starting the first hundred or so words of the next chapter almost as soon as the last is online, but this one was hard to start in terms of wanting to try and put an interaction with Thor in somewhere as he's such a hard character to write. As well as this, I had GCSE mocks to revise for during March and April, and then the real exams to prepare for this month. The real exams took place over the past two weeks and every night I've come home from school and crawled into bed and marathoned either The 100 or Daredevil. It was horrible, but I'm glad it's over with now so I can focus on this and my drama coursework. **

**Thank you for the reviews, favourites and follows, they've really helped me get through this horrible season (spring is always the worst for me, I don't even know why) and show my parents that my writing is seen. 5205 views is amazing, seriously thank you!**

**And I have seen Age of Ultron, I loved it, apart from Joss putting Bruce and Natasha together and completely disregarding the Nat/Steve friendship the Russo brothers built in The Winter Soldier. As of right now, I'm not going to add in Ultron as I already have an idea of how I want to take this, and including his creation would just really complicate the plot even more. And I am going to add in the Maximoffs as I wrote that chapter as soon as I got back from the cinema.**

**And can someone do me a favour and let me know if I'm screwing up any of the characters? I don't mind because the last thing I want is a rant saying Hermione has become completely unbelievable. It's AU and I understand the leeway that comes with it, however I do know how easy it is to mess up a character because of this. **

**Shutting up now.**

**Please review, favourite and follow.**

**Lauren.**


	6. Chapter 5

**Disclaimer- I still don't own.**

"So how did you meet Hermione?" Asked Bruce once the data was ran. Hermione hadn't arrived yet, so there was no one to stop what Tony knew coming out. Upon the discovery of S.H.I.E.L.D it was once of the first things he had JARVIS hack into, the witch was interesting; sue him!

"Last year, good old Natashalie was sent undercover as my assistant to keep an eye on me. When we went to the Monaco races she had to take Hermione with her as her dad was working out of Mexico. I didn't think anything of it, why would I? She was nice enough. I saw her again when Pirate and Coulson put me under house arrest, surprisingly strong for a thirteen year old. She was smart too, managed to cook up the lithium dioxide injection that made me live long enough to build a new reactor. Anyway, Pepper has invited her to Hammar's weapons presentation and the next thing I know she's taking the drones down by grabbing them." Tony explained.

"Grabbing them?"

"Yeah, she has this rare ability that allows her to manipulate energy in its purest form. She's like a walking EMP, shorting out a computers with barely any effort. It's amazing what she can do. I've never seen anyone like her."

"Must be hard for her to be here if she can bring it all down by grabbing the right piece of machinery." Bruce noted, moving around the screens so he could read the data better. It may take a while for any sufficient data to come through. If Hermione was here this could be done a lot faster.

"I've heard that her magic gets supressed when she's around a lot of electricity. I'd imagine she'd wipe herself about before she gets an engine to fail."

"Almost the same way the tech won't work in the school she goes to. Romanoff explained it to me last night," Bruce replied, "A whole school of people like her? Hiding in the middle of Scotland? Remarkable."

"It's crazy to know there's a whole society of people like her. School, shopping district, sporting tournament. Shame they hide instead of being open with the world." Tony remarked, sadness in his voice.

"We can barely handle people of a different amount of pigment or another normal lifestyle. Imagine how some people would feel knowing there's witches and wizards running around."

Tony winced, "Good point." He turned back to his work.

"The gamma readings are definitely consistent with Selvig's reports on the Tesseract. But it's going to take weeks to process." Bruce sounded reluctant, but knew there was nothing else he could do.

"If we bypass their mainframe and direct a reroute to the Homer Cluster, we can clock this around six hundred teraflops." Tony replied quickly, moving his hands over the glass keyboard to enter the commands.

"All I packed was a toothbrush." Bruce joked, taking notice of all of Tony's devices and equipment.

"You know, you should come by Stark Towers sometime. Top ten floors, all R and D. You'd love it, its candyland."

"Thanks but the last time I was in New York I kind of broke… Harlem." Bruce turned down the offer.

"Well, I promise a stress free environment, no tension, no surprises," Tony picked up a small cattle prod style device and jabbed it into Bruce's side, shocking him, "Nothing?" He asked.

The glass door slid open and Captain Rodgers stepped in, "Hey! Are you nuts?" He asked accusingly, disapproving of Tony risking the safety of everyone on the ship for fun. Tony simply ignored him and turned back to Bruce,

"You really have got a lid on it haven't you? What's your secret? Mellow jazz? Bongo drums? Huge bag of weed?" Tony listed.

Steve couldn't wipe the look of shock off of his face. How could someone be so obnoxious and unaware of the situation? Did Stark not understand he just couldn't mess around with Bruce and think he'll get away with it when he Hulks out? "Is everything a joke to you?" He asked.

"Funny things are." Tony pointed out.

"Threatening the safety of everyone on this ship isn't funny. No offense Doctor." Captain Rogers replied.

"No it's alright," Bruce said, "I wouldn't have come aboard if I couldn't handle pointy things." He looked down at the seemingly innocent shocking device that was lying on the table.

"You're tiptoeing big man. You need to strut." Tony turned his attention back onto Bruce.

"And you need to focus on the problem, Mr Stark." Captain Rogers reprimanded.

"You think I'm not?" Tony questioned, "Why did Fury call us and why now? Why not before? What isn't he telling us? I can't do the equations unless I have all the variables."

"You think Fury's hiding something?"

"He's a spy Captain, he's the spy. His secrets have secrets. It's bugging him too, isn't it?" Tony switched his attention back to Bruce who shrugged but succumbed to the stares from the two other men.

"I just want to finish my work here and,"

"Doctor?" The Captain cut him off, knowing that Bruce had something to say on this. Bruce sighed.

"A warm light for all mankind to share, Loki's jab at Fury about the cube."

"I heard it." Captain Rogers said as Bruce pointed to Tony.

"I think that was meant for you. Even if Barton didn't say anything Stark Tower is posted all over the news." Bruce calmly pointed out.

"Stark Tower? That big ugly," Tony gave Cap a look that dared him to finish the sentence, "building in New York?"

"It's powered by Stark's reactors, a self-sustaining energy source. That building can run itself for what, a year?" Bruce asked.

"That's just the prototype. I'm kind of the only mane in clean energy right now." Tony pointed out.

Bruce turned back to the soldier, "So why didn't SHIELD bring him in on the Tesseract project? I mean, what are they doing in the energy business in the first place?" He doubted everything SHIELD was telling him was true.

"I should probably look into that once my decryption programme finished breaking into all of SHIELD's secure files." Tony reminded himself out loud, gathering the attention of the two other men in the room. Captain Rogers couldn't hide the shock on his face. That man.

"I'm sorry? Did you say?" He asked.

"JARVIS has been running it since I hit the Bridge. In a few hours we'll know every dirty little secret SHIELD has ever tried to hide," Tony presented a packet of freeze dried fruit and offered some to Steve, "Blueberry?" Yeah, Tony felt as though he could call him Steve now.

"Yet you're confused about why they didn't want you around?" Steve jabbed.

"An intelligence agency that fears intelligence? Historically not awesome." Tony hit back, retracting the blueberries and offering them to Bruce, who took a small handful.

"I think Loki's trying to wind us up. This is a man who means to start a war, if we don't stay focused he'll succeed. We have orders, we should follow them."

"Following is not really my style. And where's Hermione?"

"You're all about style aren't you?"

"Of all the people in this room, which one is; a) wearing a spangly outfit, and b) not of use?" Tony asked.

"Steve, tell me none of this seems funky to you?" Bruce said.

Steve opened the door and stormed out, "Just find the cube."

A minute later, Hermione walked in with a plate of pop tarts and took notice of the scientist's glum looking faces, "Well this all seems cheerful. You found it yet?" She asked. Bruce nodded and showed her the screen where the algorithm was laid out, Hermione read it quickly and pulled up the keyboard. In seconds she handed it back and moved to her own station, waiting for the tracking devices to ping with new information.

"You were missing an x to your own equation, and I've also added in my own." She pointed out as the duo stared at her.

"What? How did we miss that?" Tony asked.

"You were missing out that the Tesseract throws out the same radiation I do. I added the equation they use to track me down onto yours, it should speed up the process a little bit more."

"And you know the equation how?"

"I invented it last year in school. I got bored, did some research, looked into the way the Ministry tracks down people like me and changed it for long term situations. Quite simple really." Hermione explained as Bruce looked at his own tracking algorithm.

"This is beyond the maths someone your age should be capable of." He said on shock, "Prodigy or not."

"I'm not exactly your average human being. Besides, it's the first time it's been tested so it might not even work. A lot of it was just proportionate guessing. I never got a good enough reading on the Tesseract to find out how powerful it is. At the minute it's just scanning the globe for anything at the same power level as the Bifrost or more. I can rule out a few things off the bat once the readings come through."

"This is. Wow, so you're saying you can find Asgardian artefact using this?" Bruce asked.

"In theory. It's all dependent of the sentiency of the power itself. The more it knows it's there the easier it is. It can be used to track down the Hulk's transformation, but not you or the Hulk."

"Because the energy output is high enough." Bruce realised.

"How did you know to base it off the Bifrost?" Asked Tony.

"I felt its power when it was used in New Mexico and then something similar the other week when Loki arrived. And since the Bifrost is the sanctioned way between the realms, the purpose of the Tesseract must be to do something similar." Hermione replied.

"Wait, so you can feel surges in energy across two states?"

"If it's powerful enough then yes. The Bifrost was unlike anything I've ever felt before, the magic reeling from it was light and just simply pure. The closest I ever got to feeling that was when I saw my friend's guardian."

"And how did the Tesseract feel?" Bruce asked.

"The exact opposite, it was dark and angry. It was as though it wanted me to wield it for myself. It screams bad vibes. When we get it back, do me a favour and don't play around with it. The same with the stick over there is throwing off the same thing." Hermione gestured to Loki's sceptre.

Though only minutes had passed since she arrived, Hermione could already feel a headache and a ratty mood coming on just by being near Loki's mysterious gift from his equally mysterious benefactor. She despised being near the thing that took her father away from her, caused him to lose himself and nearly kill her Aunt Maria and Uncle Nick (Don't even ask. It just happened and everyone was surprisingly cool with it.) The unnatural shade of blue in his eyes still haunts her. Hermione was just fortunate he never went after her. Hopefully he held enough restraint to not let Loki know of how she came to be, the last thing anyone on this ship wanted was Loki going after Hermione. The ship wouldn't survive the encounter. Hopefully her mother would find out what Loki was up to during her interrogation.

Lost in her dark thoughts, Hermione didn't notice that Tony and Bruce were conversing about the fight to come, "Ah, see. I don't get a suit of armour. I'm exposed, like a nerve. It's a nightmare." Bruce told him quietly.

"You know, I've got a cluster of shrapnel trying every second to crawl its way into my heart," Tony replied before tapping his arc reactor, "This stops it. This little circle of light. It's part of me now, not just the amour. It's a terrible privilege."

"But you can control it."

"Because I've learned how."

"It's different."

Tony moved around the displays so he can see Bruce a little better, "Hey, I've read about your accident. That much gamma exposure should have killed you." He told the poor scientist.

"So you're saying that the Hulk, the other guy, saved my life? That's nice. It's a nice sentiment. Save it for what?" Bruce asked.

"Guess we'll find out," Hermione said, throwing her now cold poptarts in the bin, "Hopefully it will be for good. Is the algorithm working?" She asked.

"Should be. Do you need to be anywhere?" Tony asked.

"Can't go much else with Loki here. He thinks that if I hide myself with the sceptre he shouldn't be able to tell the difference between it and me, although I may have to leave the room soon enough. That thing is giving me a headache." Hermione explained.

"Is it really that bad?"

"Horrible. I don't know how he can use it, he should sense its power better than I can."

"Maybe you'll have to ask him once this all gets resolved."

"Maybe."

On the other side of the Atlantic, Harry Potter was having a great time at the Quidditch World Cup final, although in a few short hours that would all change.

**End.**

**I know this wasn't as good as the others but I just wanted to set up the tension and have Hermione throw in her own capabilities with tracking the cube. I don't know a thing about maths, however I do believe that it being the 21****st**** century and SHIELD, Hermione should have created a way for magic to be traced as almost a backup plan if something happens to her and she's taken. And besides, one of my little headcanons is that Hermione is scary good at maths and this little tidbit will develop later in the story. **

**And yes, I can see Hermione being the first to know that the sceptre is messing with her head, I think it's because she'd be more aware of it as she knows what to look out for. With everything that went on with the diary, it would be more logical for a government trained witch or wizard to be conditioning their magic to respond to such things. Hermione especially because of her close relationship to Harry and his tendency to find himself in sticky situations.**

**Naturally, Tony knows about the magical world; in my head it was one of the first things he hacked into shortly after Iron Man 2, and again SHIELD just rolled with it because there wasn't any point in denying it and instead got Coulson just to give him some more information so he doesn't scare a witch or wizard one day on a trip to the magical world (Let's face it, it's in his character to do such a thing)**

**Please read and review. It does mean a lot.**

**Lauren.**


	7. Chapter 6

**I don't own.**

Once the tracking algorithm was activated, the only thing Hermione, Bruce and Tony could do was sit around and wait for a location to come up. Of course, Tony was the only one who had something to do, and Bruce was watching the screen intensely as dozens of SHIELD's files popped up and then vanished. Hang on a minute…

"Are you hacking into SHIELD?" Hermione asked loudly, walking over to the duo and finally seeing what they were up to.

"Nope!" Tony denied, changing the screen back to something more science related and pulling it away from her. In return Hermione pulled the screen back and opened up the recent applications, he was hacking into SHIELD alright. What even is Phase 2? It didn't sound right even for her. Most likely it was something the stupid World Council wanted as soon as possible. Hermione always wondered what goes on inside their heads for them to push for such stupid things so quickly.

As Hermione got lost in her thoughts about the Council, the lab door swung open and Fury stormed in, "What are you doing Mr Stark?" He demanded, his one eye staring intensely at the eccentric billionare.

"Kind have been wondering the same thing about you." Tony replied.

"You're supposed to be finding the Tesseract."

"We are," Bruce interjected, "The model's locked and we're sweeping for a signature now. When we get a hit, we'll have the location within half a mile."

"And you'll get the cube back no muss no fuss. What is Phase 2?" Tony finished.

The dull throbbing in Hermione's head worsened as Steve entered the room and slammed a HYDRA weapon on the table, "Phase 2 is SHIELD using the cube to make weapons." He explained bluntly. Hermione snatched the weapon off him and took it to her corner, carefully disassembling it so she could reach the power source, "Sorry, the computer was moving a little slow for me," He apologised to Tony and Bruce.

"Rogers, we gathered everything related to the Tesseract. This does not mean that we're.."

Tony cut him off again by pulling another screen around and displaying the schematics for a nuclear bomb, "I'm sorry Nick. What were you lying?"

"Steve's right, this thing has been taken apart before and the core taken out. Were you going to incorporate HYDRA's weapons of mass destruction into our arsenal? I can't believe you would do such a thing! There is no way any government would back this if they found out where you and the Council got the idea from!" Hermione shouted at her pseudo uncle.

"I was wrong. The world hasn't changed a bit." Steve grumbled.

Of course the argument got worse when Natasha and Thor entered the lab with stony expressions on their faces.

"Did you know about this?" Bruce asked Natasha.

"You want to think about removing yourself from this environment Doctor?" She asked in return, stepping closer to Hermione.

"I was in Calcutta, I was pretty well removed."

"Loki's manipulating you." Natasha pointed out.

"And you've been doing what exactly?" Bruce asked in return. If Hermione didn't have a headache or wasn't involved in such a life threatening situation she would have climbed into the vents, grabbed a back of popcorn and watched the argument play out. _Hang on a minute, this is what Loki wants to happen, divide and conquer._

"You didn't come here because I bat my eyelashes at you."

"Yes, and I'm not leaving because suddenly you get a little twitchy." Bruce argued once more, he wasn't even turning a shade of green. Why was Natasha getting so worried? "I'd like to know why SHIELD is using the Tesseract to build weapons of mass destruction."

Fury turned his glare to Thor, "Because of him." He said.

Thor looked taken aback, "Me?"

"Last year Earth had a visitor from another planet who had a grudge match that levelled a small town. We learned that not only are we not alone, but we are hopelessly, hilariously outgunned." Fury explained.

"My people want nothing but peace with your planet!" Thor protested.

"We didn't even cause New Mexico in the first place! That was an isolated incident Thor solved that year. Asgard as a whole won't invade unless we give them a reason to." Hermione joined in with Thor's argument.

"But you're not the only people out there, are you? And you're not the only threat. The world's filling up with people who can't be matched, they can't be controlled."

"Like you controlled the cube?" Steve questioned.

"You're work with the Tesseract is what drew Loki to it, and his allies. It is a signal to all the realms that the earth is ready for a higher form of war." Thor accused.

"You forced our hand, we had to come up with something." Fury responded.

"Not like this!" Hermione shouted.

"A nuclear deterrent, cause that always calms thing right down." Tony scoffed.

"Remind me again how you made your fortune Stark?" Fury sniped.

The throbbing in Hermione's head developed into someone taking a hammer to it as the rest of the group's bickering and sniping became a full blown argument. Her vision blurred as the pain got worse, but she was certain the sceptre was glowing brighter and brighter with every second. Natasha was right, Loki is manipulating us and more importantly, the sceptre was amplifying the emotions radiating off Bruce and Stark in droves. Then all of a sudden it stopped as everyone turned to look at Bruce with concern.

"Doctor Banner, put down the sceptre." Steve ordered gently.

"Expelliarmus." Hermione cast, ripping the sceptre out of Bruce's hands and into hers, Hermione put it back on the table and stepped closer into the group so even she couldn't reach it without the movements being obvious. Natasha and Fury looked at her in surprise; she didn't use her wand that time.

Her computer bleeped loudly with the location of the Tesseract as Bruce walked over to it and checked, "Sorry kids you don't get to see my party trick after all." He mumbled.

"Have you located the Tesseract?" Thor asked.

"I can get there faster." Tony called out.

"Look, all of us.." Steve began however his seemingly logical plan was cut off by Thor,

"The Tesseract belongs on Asgard. No human is a match for it."

Tony begins his way to the door but is cut off by Steve, "You're not going alone!" The soldier protested.

"You gonna stop me?" Tony relplied.

"Put on the suit, let's find out."

"I'm not afraid to hit an old man." Tony threatened.

"Put on the suit!"

"EVERYONE JUST SHUT THE HELL UP FOR ONCE AND LET US TELL YOU THE LOCATION!" Hermione screamed at the arguing duo. She didn't actually tell them the location because a large explosion tossed Hermione out of the lab window like a rag doll. Her back collided hard with someone else's front, and they landed hard on the ground. Immediately Hermione rolled away and sat up as the comm link in her ear came to life,

"Barton, you okay?" Fury asked, concern filling his voice for the youngest person on board.

"I'm okay. Can't say the same to the sucker I landed on." She groaned in reply.

"Get to the detention level with Coulson. Try and keep him in the container, drop him if you have to." He ordered.

"Got it," Hermione confirmed, before turning back to the winded agent, "Can I borrow your gun?" She asked sweetly, the man just groaned so she took it as a yes and she pulled the handgun out of his holster, "Thank you."

Coulson held out is hand to pull her up, "You alright?" He asked.

"I've been better. At least I don't have a headache anymore." She replied.

"Good. Let's go."

They left the bridge at a steady jog but used the backways to the Detention level as to avoid the men that caused the explosion, "So how's that team of yours forming?" Hermione asked.

"Good, just need a pilot and we'll be golden. Know anyone good?" Coulson asked.

"Heard Melinda May's getting bored in admin. May might not be ready for action but I bet she'll pilot if you ask nice enough. Can't hurt to try right?"

Gunshots echoed down the hallway as the armed invaders finally reached their section of the corridor, Hermione and Coulson quickly returned fire. The distinctive clicking noise of an empty cartridge came far too quickly and she had no spare clips. "Shit." She cursed, tossing the now useless gun aside and ducked behind an air vent.

"I'll deal with this, you go!" Coulson shouted at her, shooting the man closest to where he was hiding, spinning him around and using his as a shield and kicking his semi-automatic to Hermione which she picked up. She kicked the nearest grate open and neatly slipped into the vent without a sound until her feet hit the ground. Hermione crawled around the series of tunnels designed for her father and herself to sneak around in until she could see the back of Loki's head through a glass door. _Got him now._ She thought, kicking away the grate and jumping out.

Loki turned around as Hermione slammed the door open and pointed her gun at him, "Make a move and I'll shoot!" She told him, putting enough steel in her voice as possible.

"You'll do such a thing?" He returned as footsteps grew closer to the main entrance, Hermione faced it and shot down the incoming gunmen without hesitation.

"I will if it keeps you in a cage."

Loki laughed darkly as he stepped towards her and began analysing her like an animal for slaughter, "You have so much power for a young girl. And friends, such loyal friends. Tell me, do they know of your true life? Or do you hide from them like you did me?" He asked.

"If you've messed with either of them I swear to God you'll regret it!"

He laughed again, "It really is in your nature to lie and kill isn't it? We have a lot in common, you and I."

"We are not alike in any way whatsoever. I want to know how you know about them." Hermione spat.

"Your father is quite the talker, as you may have discovered. He told me everything about you and your friend's escapades over the years. Yet they have no idea how easy killing comes to you. You've lied to them and deceived them so many times I doubt even you believe the lies you feed them. How can you be in the house of the brave, when you have more cunning them Salazar himself?"

"Because I value bravery far more than I do lying. You think I'm the only one born a killer? Lies and deception run in Harry's blood for two generations. Even the leader of his society thinks he was born to kill. So do yourself a favour and shut up." Hermione ordered.

While Hermione defended herself from Loki's verbal attacks, a small handful of his men managed to sneak behind her and cover the room's possible exits. She was trapped and all she could do was keep Loki from messing her head.

"Sir is she becoming a problem?" The man closest to her asked. Hermione whipped around and pointed the barrel of her gun at his chest.

"She does need dealing with," Loki answered, "Gather what remains of the men and leave before this place falls out of the sky."

The cage opened and Loki stepped out smoothly as his sceptre was handed back to him. Hermione could feel the fear building up inside of her at the sight of Loki walking around with the swagger of a free man. It was without a doubt that Loki would do anything in his power to make sure Hermione felt all the pain she's inflicted on her targets before she died; but he wasn't going to do it such a private place. No; it had to be public, exposed so that her friends would see the real side of her and be happy about her death. She gulped and backed herself into the wall as one of his mindless servants approached her and the rest left.

"NO!" Thor roared as he lumbered into the room, hoping to tackle Loki from his position in front of the open cage.

"Thor it's a trick!" Hermione shouted, raising her gun and shooting the man in front of her as the image of Loki vanished and Thor stumbled into the cage; she could only watched helplessly as the glass door closed, locking her so far only asset in.

"Are you ever not going to fall for that?" Loki mused to his once brother. Thor swung his hammer into the glass, putting a large crack in however forcing one of the claws to release its grip on the cage and tip it further into the steel chasm.

Hermione scanned the Loki that was walking around the detention level, hoping that this one was as real as the man handling the control panel still, "Thor don't make a move otherwise the cage drops." Hermione warned.

"The humans think us immortal, shall we test that?" Loki asked, moving towards the control panel as the man by it steps back, only to be caught in Coulson's choke hold and consequently tossed to the ground lifelessly. Coulson raises his monster of a gun at Loki and politely asks,

"Move away please?" Coulson doesn't pause as he continues, "Do you like this? We started working on the prototype after you sent the destroyer to Earth. Even I don't know what it does. Want to find out?"

Loki says nothing, instead choosing to fade away and reappear behind Phil and raise the sceptre towards his back. Both Hermione and Thor cry out when it enters the agents back, sending scarlet liquid pooling onto the front of his white shirt as Phil falls back against the wall. Instantly Hermione reacts, scrambling forwards and sending a pulse of magic to the control box before sending another to the glass cage. Shards shatter outwards, hitting everyone on the level as Thor rushes over to Loki.

"Thor move!" Hermione shouts, pulling the gun out of Phil's grip and pointing it at Loki as it fires, melting away the metal walls and tossing Loki away from sight like a rag doll.

Phil swallows feebly as he looks at the carnage, "So that's what it does." He coughed out. Hermione shoved her hands onto his bleeding front.

"No no no. Phil don't leave me okay, don't leave me!" Hermione sobbed as he grew paler, Thor did everything he could to save the man's life by copying Hermione, only further up his chest.

"You'll be alright Maya, just remember who you are."

"No! You're not going to die Phil! I won't let it happen. Please don't go!"

Hermione could hear footsteps grow closer as orders were given out concerning Phil, Fury's own voice being the leader as he gently pulled her away to let the onsite paramedics get to Phil. Her hands were stained in blood as Fury turned her around, "You need to go. We have your dad. Let the EMT's deal with this." He told her.

"Lady Emerys let this go. Your healers will be capable of looking after him." Thor reassured, taking her arm gently. Hermione turned back to look at Fury.

"This is on you, you know that? I blame you." She spat, before turning around and walking out of the detention centre with Thor.

Fury turned his attention back to Phil, "Emerys huh?" Fury scoffed.

"Well we were looking for a name for her." Phil replied, earning a smile from the hardened director, "At least it's better then what we planned."

"BlackHawk was never going to go down well with anyone. Sorry Phil."

"It's alright. At least I won the bet."

"That you did."

"Two hundred milligrams of ketamine going in." One of the medics called out as the needle of clear liquid went in.

"If all else fails I want you to take him to the T.A.H.I.T.I project," Fury ordered, "Make it a level ten."

"Right away sir."

Within moments the medics were gone; all that was left was an alarmingly large puddle of blood and shattered glass. Loki had killed Phil Coulson. At least, that's what Fury made the Avenger's believe.

And everything Fury said was true, right?

**And done!**

**Please, read and review. It really makes my day.**


	8. Chapter 7

**I don't own.**

It was almost too easy cleaning the blood off of her hands, Hermione notices once the blood had drained away from the steel sink she was using. There was nothing left for her to cry, all that was left was her bitterness at Fury and the Council.

Of course she knew why they were using the Tesseract to develop weapons; Voldemort. According to a bunch of people that have never even visited Hogwarts, the normally peaceful (if only slightly backwards, extremely racist and xenophobic) race of witches and wizards were a big enough threat to risk extermination via the use of an experimental weapon. What would happen after that? All the mundane born who show magic after the extermination? Who would teach them how to wield their magic correctly? It can't be any of the teachers, they'd be dead. _Would even I be spared? Or would I be a risk to society like everyone else at Hogwarts? We're just children. Admittedly Harry's more powerful then you're average child at Hogwarts but still, they really can't be thinking about rolling out these weapons when Voldemort makes his next big appearance? Would I be given one? I couldn't live with myself I misfire and hit someone else; they'd be gone!_

Hermione stopped her thoughts before they got too far, she had bigger things to worry about. Her dad namely. She'd cleaned up in the room across from her parents while her dad regained consciousness from when her mother hit him in the head really hard. After changing out of her singed and bloody clothes and into a spare change of clothes her mother pulled out Hermione stepped back into her dad's room. He was already awake and moving around.

"You're okay." He breathed, pulling her into a hug.

"I'm fine dad."

"Did he get to you? Maya did Loki get to you in anyway?" Clint asked.

"No, he tired but he didn't get into my head as much as he wanted to. Did he make you go to England whilst you were under?" Hermione asked.

"No. There wasn't much he wanted us to do other than get the things to create another portal. He mentioned them didn't he?"

Hermione nodded, "There's nothing we can do now anyway. If he's seen them he's seen them. Harry would written a letter about it if anything strange has happened. I sent Hedwig back with a reply the other day."

"What about that mangy cat of yours?"

"MROW?" Crookshanks trotted into the room.

"So you're still alive." He grumbled.

"We let you have Lucky, and it was your idea to go in the pet shop." Natasha calmly pointed out, gesturing for Hermione to sit down so Natasha could braid Hermione's hair. It was a common thing to see the Black Widow braiding her only daughter's hair back, trying different styles before removing it quickly. Though this time the Dutch braid that lead into a low ponytail seemed to stick. Lost in the gentleness of her mother's hands Hermione stopped listening to the outside world, choosing instead to recite the instructions to the Blemish Blitzer potion in her head.

"Clint, this is monsters and magic and nothing we were ever trained for." Natasha said reluctantly. Clint looked at her, realising that his baby girl was the only chance they had at standing even a remote chance against Loki. Their baby girl, a perfect combination of the two assassins plus magic the wizarding world have never really heard of in centuries. And no way in hell was he letting Loki go anywhere near her.

"But everything Hermione was." He replied. Crookshanks rubbed his head against Clint's before jumping onto the bed and sitting in his lap. Uncomfortable silence grew between the family as none wanted to continue the conversation further. It stifled the room until Clint pushed Crookshanks away to wash away the nervous sweat that had built up on his hands. When in the bathroom he heard the door swing open and someone new and unfamiliar walk in.

"We think we have a location for Loki. Can any of you fly one of those jets?" He asked. Clint opened the bathroom door and walked back out. It was Captain Rogers.

"I can." He replied.

"You got a suit?"

Clint looked at Hermione then nodded. They both had suits in the same area of the ship that wasn't too far from the quinjets.

"Then suit up. We're taking him down."

Hermione nodded and walked out of the room, determination written all over her face. They only had so much time until the invasion started, so she changed into her suit and armed herself as quick as possible.

The suit itself was simple for what SHIELD had to offer; made out of an armoured yet lightweight material that clung close to her skin yet allowed full movement of everything. It was a pair of tight trousers and a long sleeved jacket that stopped at the middle of her thighs in royal blue with bronze edging on the seams. There were pockets and little compartments everywhere, including one up her right sleeve for her wand should there be a need for it to be used. The bronze belt that went around her waist contained enough spare rounds for her semi-automatic to launch a small raid on the White House as well as plenty of throwing knives. She slid her phone in the outside jacket pocket at the last minute.

Hermione pulled the ends of her ponytail out of the suit, ripped out one of the semi-automatics from the rack on the wall and met her parents and Steve at the end of the corridor.

"You ready?" Natasha asked.

Hermione nodded, "As ready as I'll ever be." She replied.

"We haven't got much time. Stark says Loki's launching the portal off the roof of Stark Tower and he'll be doing it soon." Steve quickly explained as they marched down the hall.

"The reactor powering the building would be powerful enough to kick start the cube." Hermione said.

"Do you think you can use the algorithm to tell us when?" Natasha asked.

"If there's a tablet or something on board then yes."

Once at the hangar bay Clint lead them into the third jet from the hangar doors, it was still in working order as there were airmen running service checks.

"Uh, you're not authorised to be in here." One of them stammered out, looking in complete awe at Steve.

"Son, just don't." Steve warned. The three men scrambled away muttering apologies as they went. Clint and Natasha assumed seats as pilot and co-pilot, leaving Hermione and Steve to take the bucket seats behind to cockpit. Hermione strapped herself in and quickly pulled out one of the nearby tablets abandoned by the service crew and launched up the tracking algorithm.

"We really haven't got much time. The power from the reactor has already been directed to the roof." Hermione shouted over the jets as they started to whir to life.

"Tell that to Stark, he'll get there faster!" Natasha shouted back, tossing back two comm links. Hermione connected herself in.

"Stark you need to get to New York now! Loki's about to start launching the portal!"

_I'm ten minutes out. You got any word from Banner?_ Tony replied instantly.

"Banner? I haven't seen him since the explosion." Hermione replied.

_Okay. See if you can try and alert the National Guard and other emergency services, get as many people out of the way as possible before the aliens come._

"There might not be enough time to start an evacuation but I can try something." She told him, typing in commands as fast as she could. She overrode the subway system and re directed any of the trains so they took the passengers out of the city instead of further in. She also opened up ticket barriers and stopped the escalators from going up.

"What are you doing?" Steve asked.

"Overriding the New York Subway system so the trains don't move people into the battle and making sure everyone can get into the tunnels without being charged or held up." She quickly replied.

"What about the office workers? Those that are in the open."

"Can you get into Times Square's system and send out a message on the screens?" Her dad suggested.

Her tablet started beeping and flashing red, "There's no time!"

"No time? You can see the Statue of Liberty!" Clint shouted again.

Hermione threw down the tablet and scrambled out of her seat to join her parents at the front window, pointing her finger at the glowing blue light emerging from one of the skyscrapers.

"It's started."

**_Ottery St Catchpole, England- the same time._**

"Dad can we go through the village? I'm bored of fields." Ron groaned as the rest of the Weasley family, plus Harry marched through yet another green field. They were all exhausted, weary and quite frankly shaken up from the death eater attack the night before; Harry more than the rest of them. It wasn't every day you saw the mark of the man that killed your parents floating in the sky.

"I don't see why not," Arthur replied, "but only to look boys. I only have fifty pounds."

Harry faltered, "Only? Arthur that's a small fortune to muggles. That's more than enough for a drink or snack."

"Five galleons between us, that's a huge amount for us Harry."

"Everything is worth a lot less in the muggle world, Arthur. Our bankers aren't as greedy as the goblins. Let me handle the money." Harry explained. Hermione would have done a much better job. She was the brighter one for a reason. Just a shame she was in New York at the minute. At least she was safe from the attacks.

"Drink at the pub anyone?" Arthur suggested, the group quickly agreed and they set off. Once Harry had the group of stunned wizards and witches sat down at one of the tables he walked up to the bar. Thankfully this one didn't have one of those no under eighteen rules.

"Can I have six coca colas and two baskets of chips please?" He asked the barmaid at hand, before turning to look at the television in the corner. The lady sorted out the drinks as one of the other patrons joined him at the bar.

"Can you turn up the telly love? I think we're gonna want to hear this one." He asked. The lady grabbed the remote and turned the volume up all the way.

_Moments ago we received news from our New York correspondents that there seems to be an alien invasion going on right above Grand Central Terminal. I will repeat that, aliens seem to be invading New York City. We're going over to New York right now with Olivia. Olivia what's going on?_

The glass in Harry's hand slipped and shattered on the ground, as did most other people who were standing with drinks in hand. Suddenly a crowd gathered around the bar to watch the events unfold. He paled instantly and couldn't help but let his knees give out.

"Harry! What's going on? Is it him?" Ginny asked worriedly as the wrapped her arm around his waist and held him up.

"Hermione's in New York." He finally got out.

And he could only watch helplessly as thick grey smoke filled the screen as a camera crew got onto street level to film the events that would rock the world for years to come.

**Tadaa! **

**It has been over a year since I started this fic, and on Tuesday I got 10 000 views! *Does a little happy dance* I'm so happy right now all I can think of is this story and the ideas for how it's going to develop in the future. Thank you so much for all the views, favourites, follows and reviews. It really does mean a lot.**

**In terms of time zones between England and New York, I put it at around Twelve in the afternoon in New York, so in England it's five o'clock at night so the trip to the pub is at a good time for service. The attack on the hellicarrier took place the night before so it was in the early hours of the morning in the UK when the Death Eaters attacked.**

**Hopefully the battle chapter will be up within the next week. I need to re watch Avengers just so I know when the characters come in and what happens so I can find a way for Hermione to slide in somewhere, and gather an idea of how Harry and the Weasleys are going to react to what they can see at the pub. I have a feeling it's going to be a long chapter.**

**Please review/ favourite/ follow.**

**Lauren. **


	9. Chapter 8

**I don't own.**

Almost as soon as the portal opened, Clint pulled the throttle on the jet and swung through the Lower East Side towards Stark Tower, shooting down or deliberately crashing into the aliens that they passed. Steve and Hermione clung onto the railings for dear life as the aircraft swung and bounced its way to Stark Tower.

"Stark we're on your three heading north east." Natasha shouted over the comm link.

_What did you do, stop for drive thru? Swing up Park, I'm gonna lay them out for you. _Stark declared, forcing a smile from Hermione as the jet turned onto Park. Natasha brought down the jets guns and began firing them at the passing Chitauri. But there was too many of them, even if Stark was helping with knocking them out of the sky.

Once they had Stark Tower in sights, Hermione instantly spotted Thor and Loki fighting on the balcony, and she could clearly see that Loki was somehow winning or doing very well to hold out his own against his brother; she couldn't really tell. Natasha pointed the gun at the fighting duo and prepared to fire, "I got him." She muttered.

Loki pushed Thor out of the way and fired his sceptre at the jet's left engine, blowing out the turbine and sending Steve and Hermione clinging to the railings above the cockpit so they didn't tumble about in the passenger bay as Clint did all he could to land safely. Thankfully the space they crashed into was empty as the hangar door opened and the quartet rushed out, halting their footsteps as they took in the devastation that ran through the city.

"We have to get back up there." Steve pointed out, leading the other three into a steady jog that lead them onto the bridge that ran in front of Grand Central Terminal.

People ran away in droves as more of the Chitauri passed by on their vehicles and fired blasts of blue energy at cars and in the windows of office buildings. Hermione fired at the passing ships with short bursts of gunfire but for every one she shot down five more took its place.

Then she noticed Steve and her parents stare up at the portal as an incredibly large leviathan like creature emerged and passed overhead, shooting out even more of the chitauri from ports on its sides. The chitauri themselves leapt out and clung onto the closest buildings; the lucky few that crashed into glass windows of office buildings pulled out their weapons and created carnage away from the Avengers.

"Stark are you seeing this?" Steve asked through.

_"Seeing, still working on believing." _Stark replied_, "Where's Banner. Have you seen him yet?"_

"Banner?"

_"Just keep me posted."_

Hermione and her parents ducked out of sight behind an abandoned taxi as they surveyed the carnage. Two small divisions of enemy fighters swooped by the Tower before swinging around, bringing down plasma bolts and explosions onto the street that ran under the bridge. A flash of green caught her attention as Steve shouted, "Loki!"

Hermione leapt out from her cover and sent a blast of air towards the street, pushing away the fleet and changing the direction of the fires so that they would hit the aliens and not the humans below. She couldn't hit Loki, as his craft had already slinked away once it had blown up the eighteen wheeler. People were still down there, gawping at the sight of funnels of flames going against the wind instead of towards them. She cancelled the spell and ducked behind the car again.

"They're fish in a barrel down there." Steve pointed out gravely. Hermione could only nod in confirmation as she spotted the oncoming wave of aliens coming from the portal.

"Go. We got this."

"You sure you can take them?"

Clint fiddled with the controls on his bow, "Captain, it would be my genuine pleasure." He told Steve, who finally nodded in confirmation before effortlessly diving off the bridge and onto the abandoned bus on the road below.

Hermione reopened fire on more of the aliens that were going after Steve as he gave orders to the police officers that were doing their best to defend the city. Often she had to quickly spin around to take out those that had tried to sneak behind her by blasting them away with the bluebell flame spell she mastered wandlessly during the summer of her second year.

Cars were tipped over and on fire, bringing out the stench of petrol and smoke that clogged Hermione's nose as more helpless innocents ran away screaming. Though it was a bus full of tourists that caught Hermione's attention; the largest set of doors were a mess of collapsed metal and the engine was smoking, and children were being passed out of shattered windows as the driver and a few others worked on opening the middle set of doors.

Hermione walked up to the window and pulled her wand out of its holster, "Get back!" She shouted, allowing time for them to move away as she also moved backwards, before using a summoning spell to rip away the front of the bus. She held it aloft until the last of the people trapped in the bus were gone, before whipping around and sending it crashing into a wave of the Chitauri who were sent flying into Grand Central's walls like bowling pins.

"I thought you weren't going to use magic?" Clint asked, drawing an arrow from his quiver and loading it into his bow.

"It was the fastest way to get them safe." She replied, shoving her wand back into its holster and redrew her gun. Firing away rapidly at the passing Chitauri who dive bombed the street below and blew up cars in giant fireballs before flying away quickly.

"This is like Budapest all over again." Natasha calmly pointed out, as she ducked a blast and resumed fire as though nothing had happened.

"You and I remember Budapest very differently." Clint replied, shooting down a Chitauri warrior with practised ease.

Hermione ditched her gun to the side for one of the deadly looking spears some of the aliens carried, twirling it menacingly between gutting those that had surrounded her around the bridge railing. "Of course you would remember Budapest differently," Hermione shouted, "I happened!"

Steve leapt back onto the bridge and reflected a blast directed at Hermione whilst she began spearing the chitauri surrounding her. Thor landed on the bridge and fried those few that remained with his hammer.

"What's the story upstairs?" Steve asked.

"The force field surrounding the cube is impenetrable." Thor replied.

_"Thor's right we've got to deal with these guys."_ Tony joined in.

Hermione wiped away the blood that was threatening to spill into her eye as she began pulling out arrows from the chitauri closest to her for her dad.

"So how do we do this?" Said Natasha.

"As a team." Was all Steve told them.

"I have unfinished business with Loki." Thor argued.

"Yeah, get in line." Clint snapped back.

"We should try to keep this on the ground to reduce the chance of any strays going after the civilians. If we all go after Loki New York turns into the chitauri's playground for death and destruction." Hermione reasoned. She then changed the magazine of her gun as Steve started to form some sort of plan. Hermione spotted an approaching motorcycle puttering to a stop right behind Steve and she waved. It was Bruce, wearing clothes that were perhaps a little too big for him but would do none the less.

"So this all seems horrible." He pointed out bluntly as he approached the group.

"I've seen worse." Natasha replied.

"Sorry."

"No, we could use a little worse."

"Stark, we've got him." Steve called out.

_"Banner?" _

"Just like you said."

_"Well tell him to suit up. I'm bringing the party to you."_

The Iron Man suit emerged from the corner of a nearby building and sped past, following him was one of the leviathans he must have been leading through the skies like a lost puppy for this moment. The belly of the creature scraped over dozens of cars and road barriers that had probably cost the city of New York thousands to keep up, and Hermione winced at the sound.

"Just destroy half the bridge then, go on, the mayor won't mind." Hermione told it. As ill-timed as the joke was Clint still laughed, even as Doctor Banner took a few steps forward and grew green and angry. The Hulk easily punched out the leviathan and the impact shattered away pieces of armour, revealing dozens of weakspots for Stark's missiles to target. Iron Man chose the most obvious gouge on the leviathans back as Steve pulled her under his shield just as guts and flames exploded outwards, covering the shield and Hermione's boots in charcoal coloured gunk.

Steve helped Hermione up as she looked around, "That was absolutely vile. I quite liked these boots." She cursed, joining the others in what would later be dubbed the Avenger's Circle of Baddasery by herself and Tony and surveying the aftermath of the leviathans death.

The chitauri let out a long and grating screech and the Hulk roared back. Stark landed the suit and Thor twirled his hammer, Natasha reloaded her guns while Clint drew an arrow out of his quiver and loaded it. Steve readjusted his shield on his arm and Hermione raised her hands and levitated a nearby shard of the leviathans armour and tossed it into an incoming battalion before they got too far away.

In the lull of the action Loki called for the rest of the forces, and they came spilling out the portal and down onto the streets of New York, "Guys." Natasha called out, forcing the others to turn in her direction.

_"Call it Captain." _Said Tony.

"Alright, until we can close that portal our priority is containment. Barton, you're our eyes. I want you on that building and calling out patterns and strays. Stark, you're on perimeter. If anything gets more than three blocks out you turn it back or you turn it to ash." Steve commanded.

Clint looked towards Tony and asked, "Can you give me a ride?"

_"Right. Better clench up Legolas." _Stark grabbed the neck of his vest and took off.

"Thor, you've got to bottleneck that portal. You've got the lightning, light the bastards up," Thor nodded, "Emerys, you're the only one of us that can go against Loki. Ge to the Tower and wait for him to arrive. Try and get rid of that sceptre and see what Selvig's up to."

Hermione frowned at the use of the codename as Steve gently pointed out the news cameras pointed at the remaining four and she manipulated the smoke to cover the camera lenses.

"A lift Lady Emerys?" Thor offered, opening out his arm for her to take. She stepped up and kept a tight grip on the straps that connected the front and back breastplate together as he spun the hammer and took off. With one leap they landed on the balcony of the tower and Hermione scanned the shattered and broken glass.

"You got anything to tell me about Loki before I go fight him?" She asked.

"Watch for his illusions and keep him quiet." Thor replied.

"I already know about the keeping him quiet part. And you should probably conduct your lightning on the Chrysler Building," Hermione pointed out the building and Thor leapt away and became a spot of fluttering red on the lightning rod. In that area the clouds darkened and lighting jumped towards what Hermione could guess was the hammer before receding. Just as fast the lighting leapt out the hammer and towards the portal, casting Hermione in a bright blue light as burnt flesh hung around her nose and lifeless lumps plummeted to the ground.

"Holy hell that's cool." She commented, before turning around and heading into the building.

_Hello Miss Barton. I'm afraid Loki hasn't arrived in the building yet. Doctor Selvig is presently unconscious._ JARVIS called out.

"That's okay JARVIS. What's the damage report on New York.?" She replied.

_I'm afraid Hell's Kitchen and the area around the Tower are badly affected. The body count is currently unknown but estimated to be quite high in this area._

"What's the chatter like in England? Can you find anything related to Harry James Potter?"

_Other than the live news reports coming from the city itself only one major magical occurrence had happened in the past twenty four hours. A large Mordsmorde charm from a campsite hosting the Quidditch World Cup final has been reported but there have been no deaths as a result. Shall I run a facial recognition scan for him Miss?_

"Yes please."

_Harry James Potter is currently watching BBC World News in a pub located in Ottery St Catchpole in Devon. There are no physical injuries but he does seem to be in some form of distress._

"Okay. That's all I need to know. Thank you JARVIS."

_"I've got Loki. I'm sending him to you." _Clint shouted through the comm link.

"Good."

Hermione stepped towards the glass windows and watched Loki crash onto the balcony and lose his helmet. He snapped up, turned around and spotted Hermione.

"I figured this is where you'd be hiding. Did you really let your Captain hide you in the shadows so the world couldn't see you?" He told her, attempting to get some sort of rise from the young witch.

Hermione pulled out one of the knives hidden in her trousers and twirled it, "And why would he do that?"

"I'd assume it's because you're both young and a woman. It would go against his values to let you fight such a dirty war. Let's not forget about your magic."

Hermione rolled her eyes and stepped onto the balcony, "Do shut up."

Loki sneered, "Make me."

She leapt forwards.

**The end. For now.**

**Well, this one took a while. Between holidays, school and homework I just couldn't get myself around to coming back to this and finishing it off. And when I watched the battle scene again I noticed that in the original draft some of the quotes were in such a terrible order I had to rewrite and arrange huge chunks of this chapter, which was a horrific process I hope to never repeat when writing this story or anything similar (I have a few ideas in the works/paper draft stage of life.)**

**And dear Hermione, using JARVIS to find Harry when she's in the middle of defending the planet. Bless. Had to put Hell's Kitchen in there somewhere. I think it sets up some possible camoes from some of the characters featured there.**

**As normal, this has only been read through by myself, so if there is any grammatical mistakes or something just doesn't sound right please let me know in a review or PM.**

**Please review/favourite/follow.**

**Lauren**


	10. Chapter 9

**I don't own.**

She leapt, and Loki swung the sceptre blunt end first towards her. Hermione ducked and slashed at his thigh with her knife. Loki reared back and Hermione took another careful step forwards, landing a hard kick to the solar plexus that didn't even faze him.

"Oh goddammit."

"As you wish." Loki returned, raising the curved end of the sceptre and slicing a tear through the suit just below her collarbone, blood welled to the surface and poured down her chest, Hermione stumbled back a little bit. How many sets of clothes did this guy manage to ruin? She raised the knife once more but let Loki step towards her.

He threw his staff to the side and raised his fists up, "It would only be fair." He offered in explanation.

Hermione threw out a silencio at his face, causing his mouth to snap shut, "Like going against a god was ever fair."

Loki's mouth moved but no sound came out, "See, that's better." And then threw a punch straight to his nose with all her (considerable, for a fourteen year old's) strength. Blood leaked out and Hermione smirked at the sight and then backed him against one of the still intact windows of the penthouse with a knife to his throat.

His eyes widened for a brief moment and quickly narrowed back into a smirk. Before he could do anything Hermione jumped up and planted both feet firmly on his chest and pushed off like he was a springboard. Or rather, pushed off the glass like a springboard; he'd vanished in a green shimmer as she fell hard onto the ground and rolled backwards to shake off the impact. Loki, or rather a version of him loomed overhead. Quickly, Hermione leapt up and tackled the image.

"I thought you'd be much better than this." Loki said, his tone that of complete boredom, he swept the sceptre along the ground a few times and kicked up the loose gravel Stark had on the balcony. The battle still raged on below them, acrid smoke filling her nostrils as she could faintly make out the Hulk carving a path of destruction in the direction of the tower. She pulled out another knife and transfigured it into a metal baseball bat.

"As much as I'd love to take constructive criticism about my fight style, I'm afraid contestant number two is ready for you." She told him, pulling the bat forwards and swinging it hard into his stomach as Hulk leapt onto the balcony. Loki flew back into the penthouse as the Hulk lumbered forward.

"I think we've got Loki distracted for a while. Where am I needed?" Hermione shouted through the comm.

_"Selvig should be coming around any minute now. Grab the sceptre and go to the roof, find a way to close that portal." _Steve ordered.

"Got it."

Hermione scooped up the sceptre from where Loki had abandoned it and snuck through the penthouse from behind the bar. The only reason she made it to the bank of elevators was because the Hulk found great and immense pleasure in tossing Loki around like a rag doll that was extremely light. Once the Hulk realised that Loki wasn't going to be causing any direct harm to the city or the Tower Hulk bounded away, leaving Loki to wheeze pathetically in his God shaped hole in the ground.

Wordlessly, JARVIS sent the elevator up to the roof and Hermione twisted her hands around it nervously. She couldn't help think about the possibilities if they couldn't defeat the Chitauri now.

An explosion ripped through the earpiece and Hermione shouted, "What the bloody hell was that?"

_"Apparently the Chitauri have grenades now." _Steve replied.

"Obviously that's something you'd want to avoid. How's it looking down there?" She asked him.

_"We could do with a little more fire if you asked me. How close are you to that roof?" _Stark chipped in.

The doors slid open and Hermione dived out, "I'm on the roof now."

_"Good. Find a way to close that portal." _

"Actually I was thinking about having a picnic with the lovely Dr Selvig. Anyone know where Stark keeps his barbeque?" Hermione replied sarcastically, staring at the glowing blue dome around the Tesseract.

_"Barbeque is actually on the penthouse floor Sabrina."_ Stark told her.

"Dammit."

Hermione ditched the portal for the time being and went to check on Dr Selvig, who was slipping back into the realm of the living just as she reached him. Hermione pulled him up off the ground and checked his eyes for any signs of the mind control the sceptre could do. The bright blue was fading away as the astrophysicist took in the destroyed skyline around him.

"What is this?" He asked.

"Loki's army. Is there a way to close that portal?" Hermione demanded straight away, not wanting any time to be wasted away making sure Selvig was going to be able to do what he was already doing.

"The sceptre. The cube can't fight itself. If you dislodge it then the portal should close." Selvig told Hermione, he opened his mouth to speak again but she cut him off.

"That's all I need to know. Just, relax. I can take it from here."

Hermione raised the sceptre and gripped it with both hands as she inched to the Tesseract, choosing the side with the most roof behind so any backlash doesn't throw her away from the building. Her hair whipped out of her braid as the wind picked up.

"I can close the portal. Does anybody copy? I can close it!" Hermione shouted.

_"Do it!" _Steve commanded. Hermione pushed the sceptre inside the portal and fought with the shield as it pushed against her.

_"No wait! There's a nuclear bomb heading right for the city and I know just where to put it!" _Stark interjected.

_"Stark, you know that's a one way trip." _Steve told him gravely.

_"It doesn't have to be."_

"Stark, I'd kill you. The magic and the arc reactor don't mix." Hermione objected.

_"I trust you."_

Tears leaked in the corners of Hermione's eyes and she pushed the sceptre in further, "Then you do me a favour and call Pepper, alright?"

_"I'll see you soon." _Stark told them, before his side of the link cut off and a red, white and gold blur flew past the corner of Hermione's vision and into the portal. Her breathing became laboured as she threw everything she had into getting the sceptre to the Tesseract. They clinked together lightly and amber tinged visions danced through her mind; but she pushed them aside out of necessity.

_"Close it."_

With a loud cry she jabbed the cube out of its hinges and dropped the sceptre. The force field drew in and then blasted outwards, knocking Hermione clean off her feet and into the wall.

The void directly above her began to shrink rapidly as she raised her hands and screamed, "ACCIO TONY STARK!"

Seconds later, a red and gold blur dropped out of the metre wide circle and Hermione smiled, "We've got him."

The suit dropped past the roof and towards the ground and Hermione leaned over the ledge to see what was happening. Stark's thrusters weren't activating even past the penthouse level and worry began to nibble at her stomach; not even the suit would survive a fall that high. And the only thing that would cause the suit to not activate was if the arc reactor was off.

Hermione closed her eyes and rolled back over to stare at the Tesseract, not wanting to know Stark's fate as he got closer to the ground. A violent tugging sensation began at her navel and her body twisted. When she opened her eyes again she was stumbling over the husk of a chitauri body, on the bridge where everyone had gathered, looking over Stark's body. She jogged over and could only watch and Thor ripped away his faceplate. Then she noticed the lack of glow coming his chest and gripped her mother's arm.

"Oh god." She whispered.

Without giving any indication as to what he was about to do, the Hulk roared directly into Stark's face and then turned back around. A second later the light in Tony's chest flickered back to life and he shouted out in shock.

"Please tell me that nobody kissed me. Oh, hey, is it over?" He gasped. Hermione laughed a little bit as Stark looked around.

"We won." Steve confirmed.

"Yay! Let's just not go into work tomorrow. Take a day off. Has anyone tried shawarma? I saw a place a couple of blocks over, don't know what it is but I'd like to try it." He babbled.

"Let's get you out of the suit first and then we'll see about food." Hermione told him.

"Oh hey you. How'd you get here?" He asked, everyone turned to look at her. Hermione looked around and then realised she'd moved from the roof of a skyscraper to a bridge in an instant. But then again, teleportation was a common practice in wizarding society.

"I don't know." She told them.

"Cool. But let's deal with Loki first."

And so deal with Loki they did.

**Annd, done!**

**Phew!**

**Okay, so it's very speech heavy which is something I'm very worried about partly because the first draft felt incredibly rushed and just horrible. Hopefully this version isn't too bad.**

**Next chapter, the sending away of Loki and Thor, and the return to Hogwarts (Yayy! I finally get to write Harry and Ron after 19000 words!)**

**I'm going to try to stick to canon, however due to this being fanfiction, it is going to go off massively as you know, universe building and all that.**

**Please review/favourite/follow.**

**Thank you,**

**Lauren.**


	11. Chapter 10

**As usual, I do not own.**

A week after the battle, it was unanimously decided that the Tesseract (and Loki, obviously) would be going back to Asgard for safekeeping; and hopefully would never be seen again. Most of the week was spent clearing away huge chunks of rubble and building that had fallen into the street, and moving whatever had survived from the attack on the Hellicarrier into the Tower; which wasn't a significant amount as it had turned out the bunks which most of the Avengers were staying in were either torn to shreds in the explosion, or burned to the ground in the fires shortly after. Thankfully all of Hermione's homework was kept in a section of the Bridge that wasn't destroyed which meant she didn't have to spend the rest of the holidays frantically redoing everything, Crookshanks had been chasing mice in the canteen almost the entire day and was only mildly angry at the shockwaves running through the carrier before being sent back to England. Hedwig had taken herself back to England shortly after Loki's imprisonment and hadn't returned. The only thing Hermione had to then worry about was Harry, and the Weasley family.

She sat by one of the floor to ceiling windows of the Penthouse level of the Tower and monitored the security footage of the pub Harry watched the battle in; keeping an eye on his facial expressions as the fight progressed and the cameras moved from one person to another. There wasn't any audio, but she could lip read Arthur's bold exclamation of _She's a witch! _And then later _Oh Merlin no _when Hermione appeared out of nowhere onto the bridge.

"You having fun there?" Steve asked as he approached, and took the seat opposite her.

"Well the one time I get to see New York is the one time an alien army is tearing it to shreds. It may be a while before I get to do anything like a tourist." She replied.

"You've never been to New York?" Steve sounded shocked at the comment.

Hermione smiled and cut off the security footage, "I grew up in DC before Hogwarts came into the picture. And even then, the opportunity to see the highlands were limited; stupid wards all over the place." She muttered bitterly.

"You could try and climb the mountains three miles west of the gamekeeper's hut. They're not as well protected." Steve suggested.

Hermione thought the idea over in her head and realised it was quite possible to climb the mountains so long as she made it past Hagrid, and then later any of the magical creatures she might stumble across when in the forest. If she woke up early enough, it could be possible to make it there and back undetected. Heck, she could even make a day of it if she went on one of the Hogsmeade days. Simply tell the boys she wasn't feeling too good and wanted to study instead and sneak out after breakfast.

"I didn't think of that." She told him.

Steve shrugged, "Well you learn something new every day. At least, that's how it used to be."

Hermione looked back over the city, "Still is, though the information we now get is a little more uncensored. Pretty difficult to cover up aliens when half the city at least got a photo of one."

"And then uploaded it to that internet thing," Steve cut in, "And before you say anything I do know what the internet is; I'm old, not uneducated."

"Never said you were either of those things. And besides, I know people who don't know what a phone is." Said Hermione.

"And suddenly I don't feel so bad about myself not keeping up with the twenty first century."

Hermione closed her laptop and began to stand up and stretch, "You'll pick it up eventually. Everyone does." She told him, and then grabbed her laptop and walked back down to her own floor.

Two days later, Hermione was on a plane to London. And in less than eight hours, she'd be on a train to Hogwarts.

Normally she wouldn't be cutting the timings this close; but due to the Battle of New York forcing any and all tourists fleeing the city and back to their relatives and assumed safety and the one place accepting flights and transfers was Heathrow Airport. This left Hermione, and the rest of S.H.I.E.L.D scrambling to find a plane ticket so she could arrive on time. Of course, Tony offered to lend out the jet; however Hermione had to deny due to one big fat stinking reason; Dumbledore.

Tracking charms upon tracking charms were placed upon Hermione's property the minute she entered her dormitory; as was the norm for every student in Hogwarts for their personal safety. What the staff didn't tell Natasha and Clint was that the charms worked across oceans and tracked both speed and location, making life very difficult for them if she wanted to get somewhere at the speeds that the quinjets needed to go. So, the sudden desire to get from New York to London in less than four hours was naturally, going to look a little bit suspicious.

Once her plane had landed, Hermione had to wait another hour in the line at customs to get her passport stamped before spending another twenty minutes waiting for her luggage to appear on the carousel. Once her burgundy suitcase was hefted away Hermione finally made her way to the tube station running underneath the airport.

As she had a little time to kill, Hermione decided to browse through the newsagents and pick up a few more books and mundane stationary that would tide her over until she could convince Hedwig to fly back to New York for her. Of course, that would be easier said than done, seeing as though she was on the front cover of every newspaper and gossip rag the store had. Hermione grabbed a selection of them and ignored the dirty look the cashier gave her when she paid.

By then she only had fifty minutes before the Hogwarts Express departed, so she quickly made it to the tube and got herself situated by one of the doors and near burst out once the tube entered King's Cross Station. With her suitcase wheeling behind her Hermione hurried along the bustling crowds of commuters and slipped into Platform 9 ¾ when a train pulled into one of the platforms. In the surge Hermione had also managed to morph back into her plain clothed, bushy haired alter ego. Not one person was none the wiser to her change.

After loading her heavy suitcase with one of the resident porters, Hermione went off in search of the location where Crookshanks had been left by one of the local agents and found him waiting by the other pet cages.

"Hi Crooks!" Hermione chirped, reaching her fingers into the cage to stroke her cat's head.

"Mrow?" Crookshanks returned, distinct unhappiness in his voice, batting her fingers back out of the cage.

"I know you probably weren't happy about the arrangement we made but we had to make sure you were safe to enter the UK again. And I know you weren't happy about leaving the carrier because you scratched dear old Auntie Simmons to high heaven. You like Auntie Simmons, don't you?" Hermione chatted away. In return her loyal companion huffed and turned around so all she could see was his back end rather than his front.

"It's a bit of a low blow to be blackmailing your own pet into loving you, don't you think?" A voice crept behind her in the noise.

"Like you can say anything, Mr-Feed-the-Cat-an-Entire-Chicken-Leg-Every-Time-He-Went-for-the-Rat." Hermione returned as she stood up to see Harry.

"You can't prove it."

"I bloody can." Hermione reached up to scratch one of the healing cuts to her face but stops herself quickly enough.

"Aliens are real then?" Harry asked.

"As real as you and me."

Harry reached over and pulled her into a hug and quickly came to the realisation that he grew another few inched over the summer as Hermione's forehead pressed against his collarbone, "And of course you only make it out with a couple of scratches."

"Well, if I knew that aliens were going to invade I would have called ahead and got you into New York. But you were fighting Death Eaters so I thought to leave you to it." Hermione replied.

"I'm just glad you're safe."

"You do realise that you've now gone and jinxed her, Harry." Another voice called out from the side of them. Ron Weasley stood awkwardly with his long limbs and slightly frayed clothes, although this time his hair looked a bit more like a floppy mess than usual, the startling ginger strands now reached his ears. Hermione pulled herself out of the hug and grabbed Crookshanks' carrier.

"I have not!" Harry denied.

"You really have. If I die this year I am so coming back and haunting your skinny arse into kingdom come." She told him, leading the march into their regular compartment.

"Hermione said a swear word?" Ron breathed.

"It's been known to happen." Hermione returned calmly as Ron finished with his gaping.

"So how was New York by the way?" Ron asked cluelessly.

"It was great, save for the part where aliens figured it was a good idea to start blowing it up."

Harry started laughing, "I forgot about that." Ron said with sadness.

Hermione opened the door and settled into her usual seat by the window next to Harry, "Ron it's okay, I understand if you forgot about aliens invading New York if you are more concerned about the return of the Death Eaters. I would be too if I was right there staring it in the eye and running from it." She explained, removing her jacket and bundling it up on the armrest.

"When did you get back into the country Hermione? You look dead on your feet." Ron changed the subject.

"Half past eight. Thankfully there's a train that goes from the airport to the underground section of King's Cross so it wasn't too bad." Hermione said, holding back a yawn as she curled up on the bench and rested her feet under Harry's thighs.

"Are you having a nap now?" Harry asked.

Hermione hummed in agreement, "Wake me up when I need to get changed."

"Goodnight Hermione."

"Night."

Hermione closed her eyes and fell to sleep just as the train pulled away from the station, Crookshanks curled up on top of Harry and joined her in sleep which left only Harry, Ron and Hedwig to enjoy their journey back to Hogwarts.

Hogwarts, here they come.

**And done!**

**Thank you for all the reviews, favourites and follows for the last chapter. And I'm so sorry if this rambles on a bit but I just want to get the initial journey out of the way. And there's actually an underground line that goes from Heathrow back into London, but I don't know if it goes to King's Cross. So let's assume that in this little universe that it does.**

**I didn't feature Loki's send off in Central Park partly because I didn't think it was necessary and it would have left me in a little bit of a brain melt trying to work out all the characters once more.**

**Next time will be the feast, the announcement for the Tournament and Hermione's sudden influx of letters from America. Hedwig isn't impressed…**

**Please review/favourite/follow.**


	12. Chapter 11

**As normal I do not own.**

Hermione woke up with a start just as the lamps begin to glow at full brightness signifying that it was time for her to start changing back into robes for the first time in almost two months. She groaned and began stretching and popping her joints as she reached into the overhead compartment to pull out her robes and easily made her way to the girl's bathroom to change. Once she'd changed Hermione left the cramped room and leisurely making her way back to her compartment, only pausing briefly to dodge past Malfoy's attempts to harass her.

"Oi, mudblood!" He shouted right by her ear as Hermione walked by. She flinched slightly but ignored him for the most part, "Mudblood!"

"I'm sorry, there is no one on the train that goes by the name of mudblood, but if I find them shall I leave a message?" Hermione retorted sharply. Malfoy stumbled on his words for a short while before snapping,

"Yeah, you can ask them where they were during the attack on the World Cup Finals."

"Well, Malfoy," Hermione began condescendingly, "When muggle families wish to go on holiday they go on this big incredibly safe contraption called and aeroplane and they fly away from the Magical World's bullshit for maybe a few weeks to cleanse themselves of pompous pureblooded bias before returning for another ten months. I would give you the location, however I may find myself kicked out of the Muggles Against Racist Misogynists Society."

Whoever was in the cabin across from the walkway began laughing and cheering Hermione's rather clever comeback. Malfoy once more began to stutter out a comeback.

"If that will be all I shall be taking my leave."

"My father will be hearing about this!" Malfoy shouted after her.

"And I'm the Queen of Russia." Hermione politely returned as she walked away.

Crookshanks chirped his greeting when Hermione re-entered the compartment and sat back down again. Rain began to lash down heavily against the window the closer they got to Hogsmeade. At about the thirty minute mark Hermione looked out and saw lightning crack through the clouds. Thoughts of the situation in Asgard floated through her mind, what was Loki's punishment? Was it good enough? Is there any chance of him escaping and making it back to his benefactor?

"Hermione the train's stopped." Harry told her.

"What?" She asked confused. She swore they were still a couple of miles away.

"Maybe the conductor didn't want to stay in the weather longer than normal and sped up the train for the last little part." Harry suggested.

"Who cares, I'm starving!" Ron interrupted, grabbing his bag and sliding open the compartment door a little too harshly. The loud crash caused Hermione to flinch and sit back in her seat before recovering and moving again.

As normal the trio made their way into the Great Hall by the self-pulling carriages along with Neville who employed a don't ask don't tell policy about the world cup and then New York. They did their best to dive into the Hall as quickly as possible however Peeves kept throwing water balloons in their direction. Hermione rubbed her throat from where Professor McGonagall grabbed her collar to stop herself from falling over in the puddles as she entered the hall and took a seat near to Nearly Headless Nick, chattering with Harry and Ron over New York and the Avengers. Ron as normal was clueless as Hermione did her best to explain the ins and outs of the Hulk.

"The best way to explain it would be to think of him as a werewolf. If the man behind him gets angry enough he turns into the Hulk and there's nothing he can do to make the Hulk behave other than to sit back and prepare for the worst when he can regain control." Hermione explained.

"Okay, non seasonal werewolf. I think I got it."

"Hiya Harry!" Chirped Colin Creevey, waving a hand frantically as he passed.

"Hello Colin." Hermione replied for Harry, noticing his sour mood and realising that he wasn't going to be up for talking with the constantly cheerful boy. Instead of talking Harry waved.

"Hello Hermione, guess what?"

"What Colin?"

"My brother is joining this year, my brother!" Colin exclaimed.

"His name's Dennis right? You told me when we were in the hospital after being petrified."

"I did. He wants to be in Gryffindor like me."

"Is he exited?" She asked.

"Really excited. He couldn't stop talking the whole ride here. I best find a seat then. See you guys!" Colin said, scurrying away from the trio and further to the front of the hall. Ron let out a sigh of relief and turned to Hermione.

"Has he ever not been cheerful?" He asked, Hermione huffed and rolled her eyes.

"Did you know it was now a crime to be so cheerful Harry?" She asked sarcastically.

"No I did not, Hermione. Obviously some of us are going to have to repress our natural behaviours around certain people." Harry joined in with equal amounts of sass.

"I'm just asking. And why is he so happy anyway? It's only his brother."

"It's incredibly exciting to find out that all the lightbulbs you've blown up in temper tantrums were caused by something most muggles to believe as a myth. It's even more exciting finding out your younger sibling is going to be joining you learning about magic! So yes, Colin being incredibly happy go lucky is perfectly natural as he now has someone he's related to share his experiences." Hermione explained.

"Hermione is it normal for siblings to be sorted into the same house?" Harry asked out of nowhere.

"I don't think so, I know Parvati's identical twin was sorted into Ravenclaw. I suppose it depends on reoccurring character traits." Hermione replied.

"So if Dennis is anything like Colin he'll be sorted into Gryffindor?" Harry implied.

"Exactly, because of how similar their personalities are the Hat will put them in the best place for them, which happens to be in Gryffindor. And besides, if Dennis is that desperate to get into Gryffindor the hat will take that into consideration and place him there."

"We've got no hope then. One Creevey was bad enough. Now there's going to be two?" Ron complained.

"You know that's how a lot of people felt when you and Ginny turned up back to back. It's not very nice is it?" Hermione returned, causing Harry to hide his remark about a burn behind a cough.

And don't get Hermione started on how many times the older Ravenclaws have hounded her to rein in Fred and George's behaviour when she's alone in the library.

Just then the doors swung open and the first years marched into the Hall, gawping and gasping at the ceiling above. The smallest, a boy with mousy blonde hair was someone more soaked than the others and swaddled in Hagrid's giant coat, he walked past the Gryffindor table and held up to thumbs to Colin and mouthed_ I fell in the lake! _Before turning to face the sorting hat.

As normal, the Sorting Hat debuted its new song about the story of the founders and sorted the new kids into their homes for the next seven years. To no surprise Dennis was sorted into Gryffindor as well as a few more people that were eager to join the house. When the sorting was completed the dishes were conjured from thin air and Dumbledore rose to give his first words for the year.

"Tuck in."

Ron muttered under his breath, "About time," and dove in for the plate of chicken legs and piled a good number of the largest onto his plate while Harry and Hermione chose to go for the lighter options. Hogwarts wasn't perhaps the most diverse or accommodating places for food choices, but Hermione couldn't deny that what they did cook was good. Perhaps it was time to locate the kitchens to give some recommendations for a more diverse food choice.

An hour later, it was time for the trio to head up to the Gryffindor Common Room. They beat a majority of the bustle to get there by taking one of the shortcuts Harry had found on the map at the end of their third year and raised little attention to themselves whilst doing so. Harry and Ron did a play by play on the World Cup Final as they approached the Fat Lady.

"And then Krum caught the snitch! But by then Ireland had more points so the cup title went to them." Ron finished.

"Are you sure you're not in love with Viktor Krum?" Hermione asked jokingly.

"No!" Ron denied, "Can't a man appreciate and art form?"

Hermione turned to Harry and raised an eyebrow, "No I don't know much about art, but doesn't comparing a living being to art sort of suggest attractiveness to you?" She stage whispered.

"I have to agree with you Hermione." Harry whispered back. Ron's shoulders slumped with defeat as they entered the Gryffindor Common Room and Hermione split off from Harry and Ron into the girl's dormitories.

Hermione barely spoke two words to Lavender and Parvati as she unpacked her belongings from her trunk and set them in the correct places. Then Hermione changed into her pyjamas, brushed her teeth and climbed into bed and spent most of the night dreaming about New York.

The next morning Hermione was the first out of bed and ready only shortly after Harry was. Thankfully it was a Sunday, so Hermione had another day to go before putting her robes back on and starting the year again for good. Hermione quickly pulled her hair back into a loose ponytail as Ron trudged down the stairs wearing a signature Weasley jumper and frayed jeans. All three of them chattered as they made their way down to the Great Hall, only pausing as Ron filled his plate with bacon and sausages.

"You know one of these days the magical world is going to notice that a diet of fried meat and local grown foods isn't exactly good for their health." Hermione commented under her breath as she served herself a few pieces of toast and a small apple that didn't taste very nice.

"That would be the day. Have you seen Hedwig recently? She flew of almost as soon as we got here and she hasn't come back?" Harry replied.

"She could have gone hunting further out than the rest of the owls." Ron suggested between bites.

"Could be."

They continued breakfast in silence and not long after the post owls came in with their packages and letters from parents and other relatives. Hedwig came in the middle of the pack, carrying a few letters in her beak before landing on the spot in front of Hermione. The owl dropped the letters and pecked Harry's hand in demand for food.

"Where have you been?" Harry asked the owl. In return Hedwig hooted and pecked his hand again and gestured to the bacon with her head. Hermione gave in and pulled one of the smaller pieces free from the pile and placed it on the table in front of the owl.

Ron peeked at the letters and noticed that they were addressed to Hermione, "These are for you Hermione." He told her. She grabbed the letters and began analysing the handwriting. One was done on the computer and printed off, and the other was handwritten on simple notepaper. Hermione stood up and walked away from the table, wanting a little privacy before Ron came barging in and finding something out about SHIELD.

The printed letter was a note Stark (although it was JARVIS who actually wrote the letter due to the incredibly thorough grammar and punctuation throughout) had written begging for access to her old textbooks and any potion samples she could send so him and Doctor Banner could pick them apart for fun. Her handwritten letter was another story all together. She quickly dove into an alcove and opened the letter and carefully read through it.

_Dear Hermione,_

_I know this seems most likely a strange and risky idea but would it be okay to communicate by letter? I'd feel more comfortable writing to someone who's in the same boat as me with sometimes feeling behind with modern technology that it. Not taking a nap in Greenland. I know that perhaps Hogwarts isn't the best place to be learning or just living in general. If future generations of the Malfoy family were like Abraxas- I would highly commend you, or rather anyone, for punching them in the nose._

_They've moved me into a redbrick somewhere in Queens. It's not quite Brooklyn but the place is nice enough. Is it normal to see the brickwork on the inside? Is there some kind of industrial chic thing going on? Because it reminds me of the base we worked out of Manchester before the move to Hogwarts. I can work with the space, the neighbour not so much. She gapes a lot when I walk past, and plays a lot of music at odd hours of the night. Should I be worried about something?_

_By the way, is there any chance you know any decent art supply stores? I'm getting pretty tired of drawing with the pens in Stark's building._

_Steve._

Hermione smiled, before quickly opening her back and pulling out a cream coloured notepad and a fountain before scribbling down her answer to his questions.

So, at least this year won't be as boring.

**And finish! **

**Please review/favourite/follow**


	13. Chapter 12

**I do not own.**

After writing a reply to Steve the next time Hermione saw Harry and Ron was at dinner that night. She'd gone to the library to pick up some books on magical laws and the boys had gone to play a game of pick up quidditch with the rest of the Gryffindor team to try out Angelina's hand at captain before real training kicked in. Of course, it was only at dinner that night did Hermione learn of what was to come of the academic year.

A Triwizard Tournament? Didn't people get killed in the first round alone? The Ministry must really be trying to create good international relations after the attack of the final, and possibly to distract the public from their failure to catch Sirius Black. At least there was no way Harry could get himself entered thanks to the over seventeen limit; but this was Hogwarts, Murphy's Law seemed to like this place.

The new Defence professor seemed to shock some of the younger students. The storm from the day previous came back stronger and more violent, causing lightning to crackle and light up the ceiling until Moody charmed the reflection away in his entrance. Moody was an experienced Auror that in terms of grit and gristle put Fury to shame; one leg, nose and eye were completely missing and replaced with rudimentary and yet terrifying prosthetics. Hermione had seen a lot of ugly things in her life but Moody topped those things that were human.

And from her first lessons with him, she knew he wasn't taking any chances with their education. It was rather horrifying seeing him place an engorgio on a spider, imperio it and then float it around the room explaining the three unforgivable curses. What came next really put a mark on his teaching style for Hermione. Even though her parents jokingly keep a tarantula as a pet despite their daughter not being fond of it; it wasn't nice seeing one go through extreme pain to only be killed seconds later.

Hermione also began questioning the nervous ticks Moody made during the second lesson why a man openly against the Death Eaters would and thus snakes in general, flick his tongue in and out like a snake? And although he did his best to hide it from the student body; what was with the regular drink out of the hip flask? Was he an alcoholic, or simply needing a potion at hourly intervals?

Steve and Hermione continued writing letters as September crawled on, and by the second week in Ron was already running to Hermione begging for her to do his homework, or at least the majority of it.

_Steve, _

_Compiled on the next page is a list of art supply stores across the city. Some are independent and others are more chain stores- I didn't know which of the two you might prefer. And as for your neighbour is there any chance she simply finds you really attractive? I've even caught my eighty something transfiguration professor gushing over you in Gaelic; either that or she was extremely unhappy, it's sometimes hard to decipher some of the words in Gaelic with her accent._

_And yes, I've already punched my generations Malfoy in the face. I don't think he's got in his head that my name is mudblood, (a racial slur for those born out of non-magical parents.) If not, at least he knows I'll break his nose if he says it to my face again. What's worse is that his father is on the board of governors so he pretty much gets away with murder as long as he hides behind his head of house._

_It's getting boring here at Hogwarts, we're at a lull in the year where the excitement of meeting everyone has passed, but the arrival of the students from Beauxbatons and Drumstrang for the Tournament isn't until the end of the month. I'm slightly worried for my friend about that; despite the odds and all the rules trying to prevent it from happening I have a feeling he's going to be entered somehow. Any advice from Captain America? Other than not get entered of course._

_Hermione._

And by the 19th September, Hermione was truly ready for something new to happen. She trained in secret and managed to write her weekly updates and whatever fanmail SHIELD could afford to push out but that was it. Her birthday arrived without the normal fanfare of her friends celebrations partly because she never really told anyone. Her parents sent their gifts in the mail that were well hidden but very meaningful to her. After all, it wasn't as though they could pop in to say hello and take her out for dinner. Until of course, Tony, ever the eccentric but good intentioned man had a team of owls drop off a large white box which was accompanied by a cream shoe box seconds later.

Lavender and Parvati gawped at the box as Hermione opened it and pulled out the card that sat on top of the tissue paper protecting its contents. She scanned it quickly and realised that Stark had sent her the dress as a gift from himself and Pepper for helping save New York. And the shoes were just an add on from Pepper as a _thank you so much for saving this idiots life._

"What is it?" Parvati asked. Hermione closed the dress box up before they could peak inside.

"My dress for when it's apparently needed." Hermione replied.

"So what's it like?"

"I haven't seen it yet."

"So show us then. It has to be terrible if you're hiding it away from everyone." Lavender snapped, unleashing her first bout of prejudice against Hermione for the day. Hermione felt her face burn in anger and stood up, clutching the boxes in her hands tightly leaving Lavender and Parvati to giggle behind their hands as Hermione stormed away. The nerve of those two astounded her sometimes. They probably won't think Hermione won't get them back one day as they think she's above pranking.

She isn't. Hermione's far too vindictive a person to even think about a prank that they'd receive well.

Only Ginny was in the stairwell leading to the girl's dorms as Hermione carried the presents up the stairs. The younger girl stepped aside to let her through before asking, "Is that your dress for later?"

Hermione replied, "Yeah, it's a birthday gift from a family friend."

Ginny span on her heel and followed Hermione into her dorm, "It's your birthday?! Oh I completely forgot Hermione. I'm so sorry."

Hermione put the boxes down on her bed and turned to Ginny, "Its fine Ginny. I wasn't really expecting anything." Hermione opened the lid of the dress box and removed the card, placing it on her bedside table.

"What's your dress like?" Ginny asked, moving to stand next to Hermione.

"I don't know."

Ginny's mouth stretched into a devious grin, "Shall we find out?"

Hermione reached into the box and pulled open the protective tissue paper to a midnight blue v necked maxi dress with jewelled straps. The material gathered at the left side and there was a small slit up to her knee on the same side. Ginny gasped as Hermione pulled the dress out and held it to her body. "Hermione that's gorgeous." She breathed.

"So let's see if it fits."

Hermione took the dress into the bathroom and began trying it on. There was no full size mirror in the bathroom, so she had to wait to see what it was like. Shyly, Hermione opened the door and stepped out, holding the dress up off the ground so she didn't trip over the extra material and faceplant in front of Ginny.

"Does it look okay?" Hermione asked, walking over to the full length mirror between Parvati and Lavender's bed and looking at herself in the mirror.

It truly was stunning. Although Hermione Granger wasn't the conventional type of attractive, there was something about the way the dress clung to her waist and hips that increased her confidence. The colour set of her tan skin and brought out the gold flecks in her eyes, making her look less like a plain Jane and more like her mother.

"It looks stunning Hermione. Everyone in the room is going to be looking at you."

"I'm not sure that the world is ready for that."

Ginny paused, "Well you do have until at least the other schools arrive. You don't have to go if you don't want to."

Hermione huffed and rolled her eyes before moving back to the bathroom to change, although she left the door open slightly just so Ginny could hear her, "And besides, if I do want to go I'll have to get a date. And who wants to go with Hermione Granger, the bushy haired bookworm?"

"I can think of a few people."

"That aren't related to you?" Hermione asked.

"Okay, maybe not that many but there'll be someone." Ginny reassured. Hermione stepped back out of the bathroom and walked over to her vanity. She began fixing the few strands of hair that had pulled free of the French braid across the top of her head like a crown.

"What, someone that likes me for me and not because I'm friends with Harry Potter. That'll be the day." Hermione scoffed and fixed another bobby pin into her hair as Ginny rested on the edge of her bed.

"It'll come. Maybe be not now, but one day."

Hermione grabbed her satchel and grabbed her runes textbook, "Come on. We'll be late otherwise."

.

.

After finishing ancient runes, Hermione decided to take some time to make her way back to the Common Room if only to clear her head a little. After encountering Loki, learning Norse Runes wasn't exactly a fun experience when you had the God of Mischief whispering insults in your ear; real or not. There were still mornings where Hermione woke up only just catching a scream from waking up right before the business end of one of the chitauri sceptres pushed into her chest.

But they passed each other on the hallway just as Hermione began making her way to the Common Room to study. He was wearing a sliver and blue redesign of the suit and her with the stuffy Hogwarts robe pulled over her bag leaving her in dark blue high waist jeans and a burgundy long sleeved shirt.

"Captain." She greeted with indifference, trying not to call attention to herself for the few people that were in earshot.

"Agent." He returned, right as Ginny floated around the corner. In a moment of sheer panic Hermione grabbed Steve's arm and pushed him into the empty broom cupboard that was behind him and locked it behind them.

"What the hell?" He asked.

"I'm sorry this isn't some magical portal to Narnia or whatever but we almost blew our cover! On second thought how did you know it was me?" Hermione asked, whispering furiously.

He pointed to the silver line just peeking out of the neckline of her shirt, "You have a scar from when you took on Loki in the battle. I remember you complaining about it every time you moved to stretch." He explained.

"Because it would always snag the stitching. Well, it's a good thing my friends knew that I was already in New York so that's very easy to cover up," She told him, "How about you? I saw you get blasted a few times and thrown on top of a car."

Steve winced at the memory, "Sadly we can't host a scar comparison contest as everything faded last week."

"Bummer. So what brings you to the middle of Asscrack, Nowhere?" Hermione asked.

"Apart from being shoved into the supply closet I was going to grab a couple of things that got left behind from when we left for Schmidt. Do you know where any of it would be?"

Hermione thought about it for a moment, "It could be anywhere Steve. We're better off asking one of the teachers."

"I hadn't thought about that. So who's nearest?"

"I'll do you one better and take you to one you might remember. And since last class just finished fifteen minutes ago she'll be in her office," Hermione opened the door and peeked out just a little, before pushing it the rest of the way and stepping out. Steve followed after and closed the cupboard door, "and before anyone asked you got lost and I'm showing you around."

"How kind of you." He said sarcastically. Hermione smirked and lead him towards the Transfiguration corridor. They conversed quietly as the travelled, Hermione answering any questions Steve had about the castle, modern technology and pop culture. Surprisingly they passed very few students on their way to McGonagall's classroom, those that did see them were left gaping open mouthed at the sight of Captain America. None were Gryffindor, thankfully; but the news would probably still make its way to Harry and Ron before Hermione could get back.

"So episodes four, five and six were made before episodes one, two and three?" Steve asked.

"Yes, so when you watch them in chronological order it makes sense," Hermione explained, "Stark's probably your best bet at a better explanation. And don't ask me about Star Trek because that's something I haven't seen."

Steve winced, "Don't let Stark hear that, he'll have your head." He jibed.

"Don't tell him then."

Hermione stopped them at one of the classrooms and she lightly knocked on the door before entering. She gestured for Steve to wait outside before peeping through and smiling at Professor McGonagall. "Hello Professor. I thought that you might be interested in the stray I picked up outside of Professor Babbling's class. I think he has some questions that might want answering." She called out, using her teacher's pet voice for added sweetness.

"Bring him in then." McGonnogal clipped. Hermione opened the door further to let herself in and waved for Steve to enter. Sheepishly, he stepped inside and waved gently.

"You know I didn't peg you for becoming a teacher." He said bluntly. Hermione groaned and buried her face into her hands as McGonagall near leapt out of her chair and approached the duo. The Scotswoman rested a palm on Steve's cheek before lifting it away and slapping him sharply.

Hermione choked as her teacher lost it with Steve, "Where have you been?" Professor McGonagall demanded, "For sixty seven years we thought you were dead!"

"The Arctic Circle? And for the record I also thought I was dead. I figured I best come pick up some stuff and get out of your hair." He explained. Hermione couldn't wipe the smile off her face- only Steve could get the strictest teacher in the school to release nearly seventy years of anger and stress out in the form of a slap.

"Of course, I'll have the house elves show you to where they moved it after you all left. Dobby!" She called.

The House Elf in question popped into sight on top of a desk, "What can Dobby do for you Miss?" Dobby offered politely.

"Could you please take Captain Rogers and Miss Granger to our storage room?" McGonagall politely ordered. Dobby nodded.

"Right away Miss. If you twos would like to follow Dobby." The little House Elf told them, leading them away from the classrooms and towards the tapestry of Barnabis the Barmy teaching trolls ballet by a series of shortcuts and hidden stairways that the house elves use to clean the castle without being spotted.

A wooden door appeared. Made of dark wood and solid iron hinges right in front of their eyes. It swung open wordlessly in a way that made Hermione think of a cheesy horror movie.

"Well that's creepy." Steve told her. Hermione nodded.

"If worse comes to worse it's every man for himself, okay?" She replied. Hermione turned to Dobby and crouched, "We're okay now Dobby. I know my way back from here."

"Very well Miss. Dobby will be leaving now." And he scampered out of sight leaving Hermione and Steve on their own.

They both stepped inside of the room and truly got a look inside and gaped. It was the size of a football stadium, chairs and other numerous items were stacked as high as the ceiling. A thousand years of lost items just left in the room to rot and collect dust. Steve whistled and let the sound echo. "This could take a while." Steve murmured.

"I say we stay together. Safety in numbers and all that. Plus, the last time I went to find something on my own I got petrified for two months." Hermione decided. They took the aisle closest to them and headed straight down, scanning the piles for anything interesting. About twenty feet in Hermione spotted a gramophone and boxes upon boxes of records. She began flipping through the topmost box and let out a displeased noise that brought Steve out of his search, "Who loses an Adam Ant record? And a good one at that?" She cried, slipping the record out of its sleeve and placing it on the gramophone deck.

"Should you be doing that?" Steve asked, as the drums kicked in and Hermione began jumping and bobbing to the beat.

"It's lost. Who cares? Oh who lost New Order? Who? That's it! I'm sending these back to my dad." Hermione boldly declared, opening the other boxes and pulling out various other records, checking them for damage and then carefully placing them in another box. Once it was full she started a second box and did the same until she pulled out what was needed until she finished. Hermione let the boxes float behind her as she moved on, keeping up the search on her side as they moved further on. Frequently they both picking up various bits of trinkets left behind on broken desks or charred vanities.

"Are you looking for anything in particular?" Hermione called out, pulling up and wiping the dust off a pair of tortoise shell sunglasses and sliding them on.

"Just anything really. No one had time to pack anything away after we left to take on Red Skull. And I guess we never really went back." He mentioned.

"Red Skull? Was Crimson Face already taken?" Hermione snorted, "Clearly someone enjoyed playing primitive catchphrase."

"Catchphrase?" He asked.

"Say what you see. You have four images and you have to guess the catchphrase by stringing what the images tell you." She elaborated.

Hermione found the white lab coat next, slung over the mirror of the next vanity. On the breast pocket was a logo, and faded stitching reading "Erkstine." And on one of the sleeves was a luminous blue stain.

"Steve I think I found some of it," She told him, throwing him the lab coat, "that's the name of the scientist that made the serum isn't it?"

Steve grabbed the lab coat as Hermione spotted the next clue on the same vanity, lapel pins in the shape of the SSR logo and a trunk embossed with J.M.F underneath. She quickly grabbed the pins and pulled the trunk free. They met in the centre of the two piled and sat down to inspect the trunk.

"I can believe they kept this stuff," He breathed, before moving to Hermione's side and pulling out the rest of the abandoned belongings of the SSR and opening everything out. Books, files and other trinkets fell out into the space around them as they both sat cross legged in the centre, stacking files and notes from one of the more luxurious looking trunks embossed with Stark in what must have been gold leaf.

"Honestly I was expecting a little more excitement from Tony's old man. Maybe some alcohol or some pin up girls. Not weapons schematics and the occasional case file." Hermione confessed, holding up another report and adding it to the pile on her right.

"Well that was Howard; put the fun stuff in the steel case and the boring stuff in the fun case just to throw people off." Steve explained, pulling out an old sergeant's hat and jamming it on her head. Hermione smiled and floated Howard's now empty trunk to join the growing pile of cleared out luggage before summoning another one to search through. Once opened, Hermione passed Steve the camera and film reel to him.

"We could give that to a kid in my house and get the film developed. There might be something interesting on there." Hermione offered.

"That would be great." Steve replied softly.

The search continued with Steve pulling aside various trinkets for him to take back to New York until Hermione reached the very bottom. Only a few bullets that must have escaped from their flimsy paper box remained on the surface of the bottom of the scratched mahogany lining. Hermione fished them out but only to discover that whoever owned the trunk had a false bottom placed inside. She reached into her bag and pulled out her chopping knife for potions before reaching back into the trunk and jimmying the base free.

The real bottom was empty. Although it was coated in dust Hermione could see a faint rectangle where the dust was lighter. Someone had obviously taken out whatever was in the bottom of the trunk years ago.

"Hey Hermione, you haven't seen a sketchbook have you?" Steve asked. Hermione shut the false bottom and closed the trunk quickly.

"Not in any of the trunks," She quickly replied, "But there's a chance it could be somewhere in the Common Room."

"We could head up there now. I don't think there's anything of value I'd want."

"Yeah sure," Hermione agreed as she began to stand up and charm the rest of the items he didn't want back into the several trunks and away again, "My friends are probably wondering where I am by now. I can get away for a few hours in the library after class but any longer and they start planning a search party."

"We wouldn't want that, would we?"

Steve moved to grab the stack of boxes he built up but Hermione quickly stopped hit by charming them to levitate behind them. He frowned and Hermione glared at him sternly as she made them float high above his head and spin in circles. Magic could be cool sometimes.

**And breathe.**

**I think this is the longest chapter I've written so far, but I do know that past this point the chapters will be getting longer as I've got to the point where most of the content has already been written before, and all it needs is piecing together. **

**Updates might be slowing down from here, exam season is coming up and I need to begin studying so that might mean that Game Changer might be shoved on the back burner for a while. I intend to update every month, however it might slow down depending on how productive I feel. **

**Thank you for all the support thus far, and don't forget to favourite/follow/review.**

**Lauren. **


	14. Chapter 13

**I do not own.**

Once Steve and Hermione had gathered everything they needed from the Room of Requirement, Hermione lead him back to the Gryffindor Common Room. Which as it turned out was the place the Commandoes spent most of their time. Upon approaching the Fat Lady, she near fainted at the sight of him but stopped abruptly when she saw Hermione stood next to him.

"Hermione dear, what are you doing here?" Fat Lady asked rudely.

"McGonagall asked me to make sure Captain Rogers received everything he and the Commandoes left behind when they left. As he doesn't know the password to the common room, she asked me to let him in." Hermione explained politely, hiding her clenched fist behind her leg.

"Why not let one of your boys do the job?" The painting said condescendingly.

"My boys are currently in the Room which you are preventing us from entering. Now unless there is another security measure I was not made aware of could you please allow us entry?" Hermione snapped out, causing Steve to hide his smirk under an incredibly realistic cough that almost had Hermione worried for a second before she realised that there was no way that Steve could ever get sick; unless of course, someone has cooked up a virus that JARVIS hadn't told her about, and JARVIS knew everything.

The Fat Lady huffed and swung herself open for Hermione and Steve to enter. Hermione muttered a sarcastic thank you as she passed.

"I take it there's a reason for Florence to hate you?" Steve asked.

"I opened the door for myself when she thought it was a good idea to hold everyone up to show off her massively lacking talents in opera singing sometime last year. That and the fact I insulted last year's Head Boy in front of her. Also, she's called Florence?! I'd peg her as a Margery." Hermione rambled.

"You insulted the Head Boy?"

"It was in retaliation to him calling me worthless; bearing in mind I was achieving higher grades than him when he was a third year. I don't take being talked down to very well."

"How did you open the door by yourself?" Steve asked.

"There's an emergency catch in case the person in the painting isn't there for whatever reason. I read about it in an older version of Hogwarts: A History and put it to use." She replied, ducking into the Common Room and leading Steve further inside.

The noise level dropped the closer they moved into the centre and Hermione resisted the urge to squirm under the owlish stares of her housemates until the jumped on one of the coffee tables so that she was at level with Steve.

"Everyone this," Hermione made a frantic up and down hand waving motion at Steve's upper body, "Is Captain Steve Rogers of the US army and the Avengers. If those of you are still ignorant to our Wall of Fame he's in the photo frame to the far left along with a group of men. And He's Captain America." She shouted, "He's on visitation on permission from Professor Dumbledore to pick up any personal belongings he left behind here during World War Two."

Dean let out a surprised squawk and went tumbling out of the desk chair he was leaning on at the same time as Colin and a few of the other muggleborns gasped or started staring at their friends in shock. Steve waved shyly even as a crowd began to form around Hermione and her makeshift stepstool, "Am I really that small?" She whispered, "This is humiliating."

"It doesn't help I'm at least a foot taller than you." He whispered back.

"What was your height pre-serum again?"

"Five foot four I think."

Hermione made a grumbling sound in the back of her throat, "You were taller than me even then! I'm never going to catch a break!"

In that moment Harry arrived by barging past groups of students with his elbows and arms before joining Hermione on the coffee table, "Lovely day to bring a celebrity to the Common Room. It's not like the entire house is here or anything." He said sarcastically.

"Be glad it's only Gryffindor and not the others. I don't think he could handle the Slytherins." Hermione replied.

"I'm right here you know." Steve cut in.

"We know." Harry and Hermione chorused.

"Wait a minute, how do you know each other?" Harry demanded. Steve paled and couldn't think of anything for the life of him. What was he going to do? Steve doubted Harry knew anything about Hermione having a very important part of saving New York from alien invasion and later from a nuclear bomb. Yet Harry probably knew more than what he let on, from his rather relaxed posture and rather mischievous banter with Hermione.

"He saved my life in New York." Hermione covered for him quickly.

"Wait, Hermione needed her life saving?" Asked Harry, shock evident in his voice.

"It was an alien invasion Harry. Alien. With guns, and space ships. I'm not qualified to handle aliens. You and Ronald being idiots yes; aliens who died Phantom Menace style no." Hermione excused herself.

"Although to be fair, the one alien you did get with the fire extinguisher was pretty satisfying to watch." He interjected quickly.

Harry gaped like a fish before shouting on the top of his voice, "RON! SHE ACTUALLY DID IT! YOU OWE ME TEN SICKLES!"

Hermione winced as the shout boomed through her eardrums before swatting Harry on the back of his head, "You placed a bet on me taking down an alien in New York?"

"No, Ron placed a bet on you taking down an alien in New York with magic, I bet that you did it with something mundane because you like obeying the law. And I won, everyone else found out on the way and placed their own bets." Harry explained.

"Who else won?" Hermione asked.

"Display the betting board!" Seamus shouted over the rest of the crowd from where he was stood next to Dean.

The crowd parted like the Red Sea as Fred and George moved to the painting above the fire place with their betting box and lifted the glamour charm above the canvas. The painting of some random historical figure rippled away to reveal approximately seventy years of bets, how much was put into each bet and whoever won. As it turns out, only Harry, Ginny and Neville won the bet on Hermione and the total amount of ninety galleons had to be split between them. Even from how far back Hermione was, even she could see the bet being wiped away and the others taking up more space so they became visible.

_March 1945- Steve and Peggy kiss… Winner gets 10 galleons and a bottle of firewiskey… Winner- Charlus Potter._

"Captain Rogers, the bets placed on you are disappearing." Dean noticed.

From out of a gap in the wall, the pouched of money and the bottle of firewhiskey came flying out, "But the people who made them died." Steve denied.

"Not unless the board was charmed to give the winnings to the next living relative who happens to be in the school," Hermione reasoned as several pouches of money and the bottle stopped in front of Hermione, "and Harry just happens to be the last living Potter."

Fred and George began to cheer as the money made by their relatives from the wars evenly distributed themselves across the four Weasley siblings. At least Ron will be able to afford Hogsmeade day tomorrow.

"This is so cool. How much money do you think we'll get if we place bets on the tournament?" Dean declared as the final few Steve related bets wiped themselves from the board and Hermione could see some of the more recent ones fill up the space.

"Not without celebrating something first. Hermione is there something you want to tell us?" Shouted Ginny, as she stepped forward with the largest slab cake Hermione had ever seen with fifteen candles shoved in the icing and lit, dripping purple wax onto the cake. Instantly the common room joined in with the weirdest variation of Happy Birthday Hermione had ever heard. Some stuck to the normal song, others took to one of the many parodies and Fred and George topped it by playing it on kazoos pulled out from seemingly nowhere. Hermione blew out the candles quickly in one breath and took the cake from Ginny so portions could be cut evenly and distributed to the house. Mutterings of Happy Birthday flooded the common room as Hermione took a bite out of her own slice of cake, noticing that she still was stood on the coffee table with Harry.

"Are you coming with us to Hogsmeade tomorrow?" Harry asked.

"I'm not sure. Honestly I was thinking about spending the day in the library researching about the tournament and get ahead of the curve." She replied.

"I thought you'd done that weeks ago?"

"Not quite. I was going to look through newspaper archives to see what previous tasks were. If there's a correlation other than deadly I want to know about it and plan ahead." She explained her plan.

"You're sounding like you're preparing for one of the contestants being me."

"Of course I am. Having enough time to plan and form enough backup plans for every letter of the alphabet is better than cooking up one at the last possible minute that could go sideways the minute it goes into place. And besides, if you don't get entered I can simply pass on the knowledge on to whoever gets entered."

"That's fair enough." Harry agreed, no anger or offense dancing through his eyes or across his face. In truth Hermione was better off trying to find out what she could beforehand even if it never actually got put to use. Maybe some of the spells she found in her research could help out with the fight against Voldemort, or rather anything that's trying to kill him that year. Harry would gladly take anything if he knew Hermione had found it and researched it extensively. But there was the fact on how comfortable she acted around a national icon. Hermione's normally polite to people she doesn't quite know, not ready to introduce them to her best friend. Something's going on there, and it's been happening longer than a three hour battle in New York…

Not that he minded, Captain Rogers was a pretty cool man to say that he's spent the majority of the last century under ice. He took everything that was going on in the common room into stride, even interacting with the awestruck students with very little issue. While he looked around the room and noticed an impromptu party in the works he noticed Hermione spacing out, shrinking into herself a little bit as her hair frizzled out like it was suddenly charged with static. Her eyes darkened and pupils blown open like they did back in the forest a few months ago. When she was scared. Harry tapped her arm gently to bring her back.

"Are you okay? You spaced out a little bit there."

"Yeah, sorry. It just reminds me of when I was in New York." Hermione replied.

"Do you want to grab some air? I can cover for you if you want?" Harry offered.

"Please?"

Harry got her another piece of cake and watched Hermione vanish further into the crowd and up to the balcony they found together during second year. It was a sheltered nook that was protected from the northern winds that people had forgotten about as the years went by. In the centre was a fire pit, surrounded by lounge chairs and loveseats from over the years. Bookshelves lined the inner walls and a record player waited to be play songs into the sunset. If you woke up early enough watching the sunrise was rather peaceful away from the hustle and bustle of claiming the bathroom for a shower.

.

.

Hermione started to study up there almost as soon as the year started. After the battle the sudden feeling of being crammed into such a hot space with almost a hundred kids at any given time scared her to death. It reminded her too much of being forced back into a car, or the guardrail of the bridge as the chitauri surrounded her like savage animals waiting for dinner, flames from burning cars would make her want to gag and find somewhere cold to quell the non-existent fire crawling up her back. Her instincts screamed for her to lash out and push them away somehow, but reality would tell her that her classmates were doing nothing wrong. It was simply all in her head.

The quiet helped her to focus on where she was. Here there were no screams of terror or pleas for help, unless you count the poor kids that waited until last minute to do homework. More often than not the coldness seeping through the stonework kept her mind from drifting over to New York: what she could have done better, what more could she have done to save people. How she could have taken on Loki any better than she did.

Hermione also knew that thinking on what might have been wasn't any way to live, so she searched through the box of records and mindlessly put on David Bowie before collapsing on to one of the main lounge chairs of the balcony. For the next ten minutes she played with the bluebell flame spell between her hands, creating spheres and funnels of light for a few seconds before giving up and trying again. On and one she went until the cold settled deep into her bones and she pushed out an incendio into the fire pit directly in front of her. The heat warmed her bones but only slightly. It still wasn't enough to stop the occasional shiver from dancing across her spine.

Another ten minutes pass and soon the noise from the common room leaks into the dorms as most of the students decided that they'd finished celebrating and instead wanted to sleep before spending the day at Hogsmeade. She didn't mind the early finish; Hermione wasn't one for parties in the first place. The need to socialise and dance badly to terrible music for a few hours didn't come up much with the job.

"That's a great party you're missing out on." A voice stated from behind her.

"It's even greater to simply listen away from everyone else," Hermione replied as Steve took a seat on the lounge chair across from her. "That way you can find out what truly goes on in a busy place like Hogwarts."

"So you come up here to spy on your friends?"

"And to study. Being up here reminds me that there's so much more to magic than what Dumbledore keeps on the curriculum. It's just an added bonus I can actually hear what my dorm mates are saying about me behind my back." Hermione explained wistfully, turning her head to point Steve in the direction of an open window that peeked into the stairwell that lead to the dorms.

"I take it you don't exactly get along with them then?" He asked.

Hermione let out a sigh as she curled her knees up and wrapped her arms around them, "When I was growing up I didn't have a lot of interaction with people my age, I never really played pretend soldiers and spies because that was what my world was really like. Most of my dolls and toys were the victim of my temper tantrums so I knew to never get attached to them. Coming to Hogwarts was meant to help me with social interaction, and instead it pushed me further back into the shell I grew up in. I didn't know much about wizarding trends or even a lot of muggle ones- so to them I was a bit of a weirdo. Still am apparently.

"It actually got worse last year. By then I think it came really obvious that I wasn't bothered about boys or getting into the dating game like they were. I never bought makeup when we went into Hogsmeade or even clothes for that matter. Lavender, the blonde one thought that I only hung around with Harry and Ron because I was somehow manipulating them into doing my own bidding."

"Aren't you doing that in a way?" Steve interrupted.

"If I was manipulating them you'd know about it."

"How?"

Hermione smirked in a way that honestly spooked Steve a little bit. She smiled as though she knew exactly when the world was going to end and how. "I'm not the Black Widow's daughter for nothing Captain Rogers. I do know how to use my own sexuality, or public lack of it as a weapon against arseholes and wankers galore in these hallowed halls."

"I'll take your word for it. You know I heard you telling Harry that you weren't going to Hogsmeade tomorrow. Do you fancy going up that mountain I told you about in the summer? It's not a day trip, but it could be a good way to get you out of the castle for a few hours." Steve suggested.

"I'll be up for getting friendly with the Giant Squid If it meant getting away from magical society for a few hours." Hermione agreed.

"Well that settles it. Shall we meet behind the Gamekeeper's hut at seven?"

Hermione nodded, "I'll see you then."

**And finish!**

**Oh my stars that never seemed to end. **

**Okay so there we had:**

**Steve knowing that Harry knew more about Hermione than Hermione probably knows.**

**The betting board**

**How the Battle made Hermione move places to study.**

**Why Lavender and Parvarti don't like Hermione (at least according to Hermione)**

**And basically, foreshadowing as to how different Hermione can be to get what she wants. Ha ha hahahahaha that's going to go well.**

**We clear? Harry and Ron don't know she's Emerys, but Harry's has around about figured there's more to Hermione than she lets on. So it's up to Harry to try and figure it out, because like hell Ron thinks there's more to her than she lets on.**

**Imma leave this here. Thank you for all the support thus far, and don't forget to favourite/follow/review this chapter.**

**And my apologies for the mishap with the url code for the last chapter when it first went up. I did try to fix it after a few attempts at uploading it again. It should be fixed so if anyone hasn't read that for fear of trying to pick apart the actual chapter from the code you should be able to read it now. **

**Annnd, I'm rambling now. See you guys in June! **

**Lauren.**


	15. Chapter 14

**I do not own.**

Hermione and Steve had managed to climb up and down the mountain hours before even the fastest of Hogsmeade shoppers managed to arrive back in the castle. It wasn't a too difficult of a climb for the two of them, and Hermione managed to take her digital camera and capture some breathtaking photos of the castle as the sunlight peaked over the astronomy tower and bathed the stone in golden light. She'd have to send a copy to the Magical Affairs office in SHIELD to stick on their wall of wonderful things.

When they got back no one had realised they'd even left, simply thinking Hermione had managed to crawl out of the library for food before sinking back into her natural habitat for six more hours. Although Steve couldn't stay much longer as his Portkey back to London was scheduled to leave before Harry and Ron returned. He'd departed quietly and without much fuss, promising Hermione he'd be returning soon.

And then she was alone; so she knuckled down and started her research.

Checking out every issue of the Daily Prophet from the years the tournament had been rather easy. Even taking them back up to the balcony wasn't a difficult task until it came to opening doors. Somehow newspaper became a really good doorstop. Once up at the balcony Hermione worked out a very clear pattern for the tournament other than simply dangerous.

The first task was some form of testing how well they cope under pressure as well as a test of wit. Contestants had to make it past an obstacle of some form to retrieve an item. There was no way of knowing what the obstacle was or how it was going to react (unless of course you cheated.)

The second was a test of nerve. Placed under a time limit Hermione noticed that previous contestants had to go into something dangerous to retrieve an important item of sorts. Fail to make it there and back with the item in an hour or less the item was lost forever.

The third however had the most difficult pattern to track. From what she could gather it was a test of resourcefulness and overall knowledge of magic. Hermione put it down to what they were growing in the quidditch pitch and made sure to put in a request of a satellite image of the area in her next report to Fury.

Hermione then noticed that she still wore her climbing gear, and was still covered in mud from when she fell ass over teakettle into a ditch after the branch she climbed snapped in two. After showering and changing into a floral print skirt and simple white blouse and tan brogues Hermione went back out to search the bookshelves for anything useful. Within the first ten minutes Hermione had already sorted the majority of the shelves into two piles: useless and potential. She hoped that some of the books would be treasure troves of information, most of the ones she had put into the potential pile had publishing dates from Grindlewald's reign of anarchy. And there was only one book left.

It was wrapped in patterned paisley cloth that had some strange gold dust that enveloped herself and the book in a cloud of bright gold dust. Nothing happened even as the dust settled down as Hermione opened the book. And began scanning the pages aimlessly. There wasn't anything important, just some mindless scribbles of dates and locations between incredibly detailed sketches of people and landscapes of countryside from across Europe. Hermione leafed back and forth through the pages, wondering why this wasn't taken home by anyone but left abandoned on a shelf instead.

Then she noticed that one of the incredibly detailed pencil sketches sort of looked familiar, a smiling man wearing an army uniform with a sergeant's insignia on the sleeve. A sergeant's insignia. James Barnes; Steve's best friend from childhood.

She'd found his notebook!

Hermione left the balcony to check the clock in the common room. It was only one, so Steve still should be here if he said the portkey was leaving at half past. Only thing was; Hermione had to search the entire castle in less than half an hour. And that was near impossible. She quickly wrapped the book back in its cloth and tore her way out of Gryffindor Tower, skipping steps every so often and even losing her shoes on one of the trap stairs she forgot to jump over in her desperation to reach Steve. Clad only in her socks Hermione reached the transfiguration corridor and saw Steve's back leaving one of the classrooms and walking away from her.

"Steve!" She shouted whilst running. He didn't hear her, "Rogers!" She tried again. He quickly turned around and raised his eyebrow at Hermione who started to slow down to a fast walk. However the marble floor wasn't on her side and she began sliding towards him uncontrollably. He reached out to grab her as Hermione crashed into him but then fell over himself because he didn't anticipate the speed she was going. They landed on the ground, Hermione on top of Steve. Once she registered who she was on top of Hermione rolled of and joined him in staring at the ceiling.

"Have you ever thought about a career in American Football?" Steve asked.

"I value my brain too much to deliberately give it concussion and possible brain damage," Hermione replied, "Also, I found that sketchbook you were missing."

"The small one in the paisley cloth?" Steve guessed. Hermione reached over and placed it on his chest. Steve grabbed the sketchbook and began leafing through the pages, analysing the sketches with a beady eye for any devil horns and moustaches that had been added to his work, "I thought this was gone for good." He exclaimed after a while.

"Nothing is lost in Hogwarts; just misplaced until the right person finds them." Steve looked at shoeless feet with a raised eyebrow. "They were too tight anyway." Hermione muttered, thinking he was looking at the lack of shoes.

"I was more looking at the socks."

Hermione also began staring at the cartoon versions of her dad covering her feet, "Do you like them? My dad and Tony have a competition to find the most obscure Avengers merchandise possible and I got a load of it as birthday presents because they won't wear it themselves." She explained, wriggling her toes slightly to watch the fabric stretch and contort in ridiculous positions.

They both got up at the same time and dusted themselves off, "Have they come up with a logo for you yet? They were arguing over it down in HR when I left for here." Steve asked.

"They're not even close to a shortlist of concepts I like. I got given hearts in the last concept sketches." She told him.

"You don't even like romantic movies!" Steve recalled from a memory of her sneering at the TV when a modern movie came on. Something about a prostitute and a millionaire? He never bothered to check the plot before she changed the channel over to something else.

"Exactly!" Hermione agreed, "I thought you were supposed to leave today?"

Steve shook his head, "It's been pushed back until after dinner because of time difference between here and New York. Do you think I could hide in the Common Room with you?"

Hermione thought for a moment, "As long as you let me control the radio."

"I can do that."

They both walked back to the main entrance in comfortable silence and made it halfway up the main staircase when Steve suddenly stopped. Tension filled his posture as his hands clenched into fists. Anger danced in his eyes as Hermione stopped with him and grabbed his attention back by grabbing his arm and digging her nails into the flesh.

"Is everything alright?" She asked.

"Just overheard something unpleasant." He replied stiffly.

"If it was racist, sexist or about me you're most likely listening to Malfoy trying to get a rise out of you. I'd ignore him if I were you, he's all bark and no bite until he gets a crowd. And where Malfoy is a crowd of some sort isn't far behind." Hermione explained.

"So he's a coward?"

Hermione sighed and pushed ahead, "A coward with a sixth sense for crowds and Harry. We still haven't figured out if he stalks us or has the luckiest rabbit foot in existence. He always appears at the right time and it's so weird." She told him.

"Do you think he'll leave it alone if we pretend he doesn't exist?" Steve suggested. Hermione kept moving up the stairs so they were further away from earshot.

"Nope."

Harry and Ron were surprisingly waiting for them outside of the Common Room entrance when they finally made it. They were both red faced from the cold but happy about their new snacks that would tide them over until the October visit. Harry also brought her some chocolate from Honeydukes that was so popular she once almost fought George over it. Once settled and changed back into something a little more comfortable the trio (and Steve) settled themselves on a set of chairs that meant they could close themselves off from their fellow peers but still converse freely between them. Hermione laid her head in Harry's lap and read out her findings from her notebook about the Tournament. Ron and Steve on the other hand began a fiercely competitive game of chess.

"How are you so good at this?!" Ron shouted, watching yet another one of his pieces be obliterated by Steve's extensive strategic moves and Army training.

"I was ill a lot as a child. Chess was one of the few things I was allowed to play." Steve defended.

"You also forget he's one of the most famous strategic minds of the twentieth century. He did this stuff for a living Ron." Harry pointed out. Hermione smiled.

"Look at you remembering your Primary school days." She teased. She was pretty sure that every child in the modern world at least heard of Captain America, so for a primary school to study him wasn't a surprise.

Harry gasped, "I'll have you know that World War Two was the only subject Dudley and I could both agree on for our History project." He told them.

"You and Dudley got along on something?" Hermione asked. This was new, normally mention of the Dursley family came with something horrible.

Harry shrugged, "We were assigned partners on a history project for our year six presentation. We couldn't decide on anything until one of the Captain America documentaries came on TV one night. Dudley wanted to know more about all of the explosions and how they worked and I wanted to why it only took one man to finally conclude the war; so we found out as much as we could about the Howling Commandoes and presented it to the class. Once we realised that my extensive research and his enthusiasm for violence could actually put us both in the teacher's favour we started to make sure we worked together on as much homework as we could. I also think the guarantee for chocolate also solidified his work incentive." He explained.

"Well that's one way to do it." Hermione mused, turning another page in her book, "Do you think if I offered Ron a chocolate frog for every piece of homework he completed without any help he'd actually do it?"

"Shove off Hermione." Ron grumbled, moving another piece into place.

"I take that as a no then?" Harry asked. Ron said nothing and instead could only watch another piece be destroyed by Steve. Hermione and Harry shared a look to remind each other to let him cool off before teasing him again. Ron's hot temper often meant that it took Hermione and Harry a while before they could start gently ribbing into each other without Ron feeling offended. Tense minutes passed where the chess game continued in silence and Hermione passed Harry her book to read for himself and later the clock tower boomed its bell for evening meal. Wordlessly the chess game and Hermione's notebook were left abandoned on the sofa and the group left for the Great Hall. Once there Steve took a seat next to Hermione that overlooked the Slytherin table and Harry and Ron took seats across from them. They ate the usual serving of British food whilst chatting comfortably with those that were around them, with Steve occasionally noticing he knew some of the student's grandparents or even great grandparents and asking the trio who they were.

Until of course his position in the Hall lead him to spotting Draco Malfoy death glaring the group from the other side of the room. Steve leaned in towards Hermione, "I take it that the blond giving you the stink eye is the one I overheard earlier?" He asked. Hermione put down her drink and nodded.

"Malfoy was talking about you?" Ron asked, face growing slowly red in anger, "What did he say?"

Hermione shrugged and continued eating, "I didn't bother to get the details. As far as he knows it failed." She told them.

"Hermione you can't let him treat you like that. It's wrong." Harry replied, she shrugged again and stabbed her fork into an innocent potato.

"What am I supposed to do Harry? It isn't as though there's a book I can read that teaches me about dealing with bullies," She exclaimed. Ron and Harry gave her a pointed look that told her that they didn't believe her. Hermione breathed out harshly through her noise and then pulled her fork out of the potato she'd stabbed, "I have a plan that doesn't involve either of you as a matter of fact!" She eventually shouted.

All she needed was a mad scientist. Luckily for her she had one on speed dial.

**And finished. **

**I was planning to have the arrival of the students in here but then I just kept on getting stuck. It's so hard trying to work out how everyone would interact with the story being different. Add in exams and then unreliable internet connection on my laptop, it's not been easy finding motivation to update in June. **

**Anyway, here's the chapter. And I'll see you soon with the next one. **

**Don't forget to favourite/follow/review. **

**Lauren. **


	16. Chapter 15

**I do not own.**

Exactly twelve days later her plan came into action. On the morning of the day the potential champions from the other schools arrived Draco Malfoy woke up as per normal, changed into his best robes and styled his hair to as close to perfection as possible before joining Crabbe and Goyle for breakfast in the Great Hall. As per normal the Slytherin sneered at the Golden Trio as they passed.

Not noticing the tiny blue tablet Hermione slipped into his morning pumpkin juice Draco took a large gulp to hold his tongue. Today was not the day to start fights; he needed to be in a pleasant mood to converse with the students from Drumstrang otherwise he wouldn't ever influence_ certain_ heirs to influential European families into forming an alliance with the Malfoys for the years to come. He'd spent the entire summer learning Bulgarian just for this one conversation. As cunning and as deceptive Draco may appear to be he had never once noticed the tiny little blue pill sit at the bottom of his goblet and fall into his mouth during one of the last swallows of his morning drink. Which naturally, lead to trouble in the later hours of the day.

Whatever the tablet contained didn't work until the minutes leading up to the arrival of the students from Beauxbatons and Drumstrang. Once all the students had been arranged into neat lines of both house and year group and made slightly more presentable, the staff had realised that most of the visiting students would have issues with the language barrier; and there wasn't time to cast translation runes into the ward stones that protect the castle.

"What do we do Albus? This could be disastrous." Flitwick pleaded.

"We'll simply have to leave it be until we can work on the wards." Professor Dumbledore replied gravely. Meanwhile McGonagall had split off from the staff in search of a student or two who knew the visiting languages. When she reached the lines of fourth years and asked the question the first two hands shot up. Immediately Hermione was accepted, the transfiguration teacher knew that the young muggleborn was very capable of speaking multiple languages as she'd been the first, and only to be able to pronounce some of the spells originating from East Europe. The second however; well Minerva wasn't sure at all to accept Malfoy, but did do anyway out of curtesy for his services. Once the boy stepped out of the line however, it was another story altogether.

"In fact Mr Malfoy it might be best if you went back inside and sorted yourself out. That is completely unacceptable and I want it dealt either before the students arrive or you don't come back at all!" She ordered. Draco looked at her clueless.

"Oh my God that's disgusting!" One of the girls who turned to listen to the conversation cried out, pointing at his downstairs area. The students began to laugh as the boy began to key into what everyone was both disgusted by and yet laughing out, let out a yelp and ran back into the castle with his tail between his legs. Well, more towards his stomach actually.

Gradually the students recovered from what had happened and turned back to patiently waiting. Hermione moved to stand next to the Headmaster and Professor Dumbledore, smirking the whole time. A shorter amount of time passed before she could make out a small shape speed towards them from the horizon, it was hard to make out what it was at first but then Hermione noticed the shape was a flying horse drawn carriage. She was a little disappointed at first; although the horses were flying, seeing leviathans up close and personal changed her opinion on all things that could fly. Honestly she didn't believe there was anything in the universe that could top what she saw in New York.

The carriage pulled closer and landed with a loud clatter of hooves on cobblestone. It was powder blue and pulled by horses that appeared to be able to potentially take Hagrid's weight if they so choose. They stopped and turned just a few metres parallel of Professor Dumbledore and opened the doors. Out stepped the largest woman Hermione had ever seen; even surpassing Hagrid in height. The lady wasn't any assistance to the horses judging from her opulent clothing that simply screamed French wizarding fashion; so she must be the Headmistress of Beauxbatons.

"My dear Madame Maxine," Said Professor Dumbledore. "Welcome to Hogwarts."

"Dumbly-dorr. I 'ope I find you well?" Madame Maxine replied.

"On excellent form, I thank you. Might I introduce you to Hermione Granger, she is to help with translating between the three languages until we manage to key a translation rune into the wards. I'm afraid we've been rather unprepared recently." He explained, gesturing to Hermione. In response Hermione curtseyed and replied quickly in French.

_"My apologies if I accidently insult one of your students. I'm afraid I'm a little out of practise with French." _

Madame Maxine raised an eyebrow in shock before waving for her students to come out of the carriage. _"I can assure you that if you were making any mistakes my students will be able to let you know. May I say you're very fluent for someone so young, how long have you been learning?" _The headmistress asked.

_"I've been speaking French since I was three, my parents thought it would be important for me to know at least another language for the future as a precaution." _

By then all of her students, a mixture of girls and boys in their late teens, had shuffled out of carriage and stood shivering behind their headmistress. They were clad only in sky blue robes made of fine silk which flapped uselessly in the wind; providing them very little shelter from the cold biting winds of Scotland's Autumn. Immediately Hermione lead them into the antechamber on the side of the Great Hall and cast fires into the torches and fireplaces. _"My apologies if nobody warned you about the weather. It will get colder in later months and we normally get very heavy snow sometime in December. If there is anything we can do to make you feel more comfortable please let one of the staff know." _Hermione apologised yet again. Why Dumbledore hadn't bothered to warn Beauxbatons about the weather was beyond her.

_"Is there any chance for warmer clothes immediately?" _One of the male students demanded.

_"We can look through lost and found for anything that matches your school colours. If that isn't to your liking you'll have to buy robes in the nearby town."_ Hermione replied, "_Please make yourselves comfortable around the fires. I also have to meet with the students from Drumstrang."_

Hermione turned on her heel and left the room before one of them could get snappy about having to deal with old clothes. When she got back to the courtyard she'd noticed that the lake had suddenly acquired a pirate ship baring the flag for what must have been Drumstrang. Hermione met and greeted the Headmaster and the students the same way she did Beauxbatons, however her Bulgarian (where a good majority of the group were from) was a bit stronger thanks to the accent being a little closer to her mother's own first language. Once they were moved inside Hermione joined Harry and Ron back at the Gryffindor table and stayed quiet despite their persistence for answers about both schools and what had happened with Malfoy.

"Well that was an unfortunate event for Malfoy. I almost felt sorry for him. Almost being the key word here." Ron whispered. Harry sniggered as Malfoy walked into the Hall with his head down, tail now firmly stuck between his legs. Hermione cocked her head to the side and smirked, pulled out a clear pill bottle from her robe pocket and shook the contents of tiny blue pills around the glass.

"Muggle heart medicine can lead to certain unfortunate circumstances with the blood flow in the downstairs department. However some people would consider that a victory if taken at the right time." Hermione explained smugly. Harry and Ron both paled and pulled their water goblets closer to themselves in fear of her using the tiny blue tablets on them next.

"You're scary, you know that right Hermione?" Ron told her. She grinned and pocketed the bottle as the Drumstrang delegates entered the room. Immediately whispers broke out as the stoic teens marched inside in a perfectly timed block. All thoughts of what happened to Malfoy were brushed aside the second Ron caught a glance of Viktor Krum and began shaking Hermione's shoulder violently, "Look its Viktor Krum! Over here! Over here!" He began shouting, waving his free hand around in a desperate attempt to catch the Bulgarian's attention. It did just so, instead of sitting down he politely asked Hermione.

_"Where's the best place for us to sit?"_

_"The table wearing the green and silver will be best suited to most of your friends. If you don't want to stay there there'll be plenty of spaces available across the other tables." _She replied. Viktor nodded and the group moved forward and sat with the Slytherins much to Ron (and other Gryffindor's disappointment.)

"Why are they sitting with the Slytherins?" Ron sulked.

"Because Slytherin are the closest house we have to Drumstrang values and traditions, and if they don't like them as dinner companions then they'll move around until they find a group they like." Hermione explained.

"Are you sure they'll move around? Won't the language barrier close down most of their efforts seeing as though you're the only one that can speak Bulgarian?" Suggested Harry.

"Only a majority of the group speak Bulgarian. The rest come from Germany and possibly Norway, and besides, Professor Dumbledore is going to work on the translation runes tomorrow so I'm not translating for the entire school for the rest of the year." She replied.

Harry nodded and turned to Dumbledore as he commenced his speech about the tournament. Hermione absentmindedly tuned out; only picking up on vital parts of what her headmaster was saying such as being seventeen and older to enter and the age line preventing any one younger entering themselves for a chance to win. It was an odd precaution, considering that Fred and George were the sort to bend the rules and with a decent throwing arm or plenty of pieces of paper, toss their names into the cup from beyond the line. Heck; that would be Hermione's way in if she would be so stupid as to enter. Even then, the young spy could see dozens of holes in the plan ranging from potions to bribery. It only took one person (usually Voldemort) for everything to go sideways.

By the end of the first week of the Goblet of Fire being introduced, most of the visiting students had entered and all of the Gryffindors aged seventeen and older had put in their names with a big fanfare and a massive party later on in the Common Room. And despite all warnings given to those trying to enter but still underage; Fred and George tried and failed to enter their names into the Cup, resulting in everyone finding out how they would turn out as pensioners. The only other notable entries were Cedric Diggory from Hufflepuff, and a couple of Slytherins who sent Ron berserk at the nerve of their actions. It seemed that everyone thought Gryffindor were the ones to take the Hogwarts entry.

.

.

.

I, Harry James Potter, of sound body and mind, am aware of a great deal of many things about myself: I'm a wizard, a saviour, hero, somewhat attractive, closeted bisexual, Game of Thrones fan, Malec shipper, Team Prim, massive Batman nerd and ugly crier at the ending of The Fault in Our Stars. What I am not is stupid; contrary to popular belief.

What I do know however, is that the minute Hermione walked into the Common Room with six feet two inches of human perfection following her with a look of awe on his face I started to get a little suspicious. Hermione isn't the sort of girl who catches the attention of most of the boys in Hogwarts. Don't get me wrong Hermione is pretty, she's come a long way since our first year together; but since she hides herself in the library she doesn't get a lot of chances for Hogsmeade dates. I mean if she isn't into romance then that's fine; I don't think I'm ready. Anyway back to Captain Hotness… I mean Captain Rogers. He wasn't uncomfortable around her, which was strange to watch considering barely anyone can keep up with her brilliance. That was the first clue in; normally it took a while to get used to being around Hermione's all-knowing personality- which meant that they knew each other for longer than the few minutes in the heat of the Battle of New York. And secondly- how would someone like Captain Rogers remember Hermione in the midst of saving thousands of people if they only met over just a few minutes?

Detective Harry mode activated!

So this could mean one of two things; either Hermione played a slightly bigger part in the battle of New York and had a memorable conversation with Captain Rogers and them meeting in Hogwarts was just simply a massive coincidence. OR- Hermione's parents secretly work for the government organisation that found Captain Rogers in the ice and they knew about each other so when Steve came to Hogwarts on visitation he had someone aware of the organisation to show him around.

Okay, the last one seems like a bit of a stretch but it isn't as though Hermione is someone like Emerys right?

Right?

**And done.**

**A little shorter than normal but then again I've pretty much been ill since posting the last chapter. Finding motivation to write and update was a little difficult, hence the change in POV to Harry in first just for variety and so you guys know what he's thinking and up to during all of this. It will stay in first person just so you know the perspective has changed but they won't be too long; maybe at the start or end of a chapter because I find it difficult to write first person without feeling boring and repetitive. **

**And can I just say that you guys are the best! Your responses have been so kind and positive (minus the one person who never bothered to get past the prologue) and the fact so many of you choose to read this makes me want to continue and hopefully finish sometime in the future. Please continue to read/review/favourite/follow.**

**Thank you all so much.**

**Lauren**


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